Blood Ties
by Decantate
Summary: Your parents have changed half of the world. What will you do with the other half? The consequences of Morrigan's ritual as seen through the eyes of Zevran and his children. Blood Poison's sequel. Currently on hold.
1. Chapter 1

_AN: Welcome to Blood Ties! You may be a little confused if you haven't read Blood Poison yet, but thank you for reading!_

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* * *

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When Shartan was three years old, his parents laughed and teased each other because he would fuss and reach for his papà whenever mamma held him. He did not have the words to say that though his mamma was gentle when he was awake, in his dreams he would know the slap of his mother's palm, the switch lashing over his back.

When he was nine years old Shartan would dream so vividly of kissing girls that he often jerked himself awake in revulsion. His papà found him once in the middle of the night awake and eating grapes, so Shartan told him about these disturbing dreams. Papà laughed and told him that he would not always mind the thought of girls kissing him, but Shartan doubted it, remembering their too-soft mouths.

At twelve Shartan struggled in learning magical theory, for Madre pressed him to learn and try all of the schools of magic, even those that she did not master. Magic seemed so difficult to shape on theory alone, but when he slept, he felt like he understood it. Power bloomed in his body in his dreams and in his hands he shaped miracles.

When Shartan was sixteen, his very first love said this:

"Of course I want you, Shartan. Have you looked at yourself? You're the most gorgeous boy in the whole village! Everyone wants you! But I'm not going to..." Gian made an uncomfortable face, "…_be_ with you. I'll be getting married in a few years. To a _girl._ And I know your parents are… important… but you're still an elf, no? It wouldn't look right."

That night when he eventually slept Shartan knew what a bird felt when it cupped air beneath its wings and rode the piercing winds above the clouds, but when he landed again he stood on his own feet.

Shartan was nineteen years old when the Warden came. At nineteen Shartan had been too busy and exhausted to grieve for his mother's death, for he had taken over the vineyard management to spare his father the worry and was also trying to teach Surana control of her magic when his own control was still a nebulous thing at best.

The Warden brought an amulet, the one Alistair always wore, and said that Alistair himself had wanted it taken to Shartan, the son of his heart. Shartan felt grief finally cracking the stone beneath his feet and he left the house. He ran between the trellises, Alistair's amulet beating against his chest, and magic poured through him until he spread black wings and launched into the air, too maddened to question his mastery of a magic that no one had taught him.


	2. Chapter 2

"Papà. Papà. Get up."

Zevran barely groaned.

"Papà. Get up." The shutters in his room were thrown open and Zevran hissed a few choice words.

"You know, the mothers in the village don't say such things around their children."

"They have less interesting parents than you, my treasure." Zevran grumbled this and struggled very briefly with the temptation to cover his face against the blinding light… he gave in and threw a pillow over his head.

His cruel daughter ripped the blankets off of his bed. "You have forgotten to get up for two days again and Shartan is sick with worry. Get up!"

"Brasca. You sound just like Wynne."

"Who is that?"

"A sour old woman in Ferelden who kept scolding your Madre for sharing my bed."

"Oh, this is supposed to be a compliment, is it?" Surana said scornfully. She was trying to rip the sheets off of the bed now with him still in it. "My Padre who likes to embarrass me by making all of the ladies in the village go red? I will tell them how you have lost your touch. Get up! I have cooked dinner and you will eat some of it."

"You _cooked?_ This is supposed to be some kind of an enticement, truly?"

Quick as lightning Surana punched him in the stomach. There was a smack of skin on skin and Zevran grunted. She ran across the room, spilling nervous giggles. "Shartan!" she shouted. "Shartan! I punched Padre!"

"You _did?_ Is he _dead?"_

"No!" Surana was laughing hysterically now. "He only smells like it!"

Zevran finally cracked his eyes and found himself struggling not to smile. "There is something truly wrong with our family I think."

"Yes and the root of it is your smell. I have drawn you a bath."

The humor fled. "Cold water…" Zevran muttered against the pang. He had grown spoiled, living with a mage for so long.

"No, I have warmed it a little, just as you like, Papà."

"A fire spell under water?"

Surana nodded, darkening under her olive skin. Zevran softened. "Well, for that I will get up, I think." He rolled out of bed.

* * *

Supper wasn't bad. The spices were all wrong, but it was bland enough that it didn't entirely ruin the food. Both Shartan and Zevran made polite and encouraging compliments, which sharp-eyed Surana saw right through.

There was a lull in the conversation later on, all three of them looking down at their plates. Surana broke it, the words high and trembling a little, briefly as young as she truly was.

"Are you going to get better, Papà?" Shartan grew still, looking at his sister and then, curiously, at his father, as if even he did not guess the answer.

Zevran shut his eyes. He could feel Neria, knew her breath in the fourth chair at the table. Her hair was on the chest in his room and it _hurt_ to look at Shartan for how much he could see his mother in his face. Almost every breath Zevran took was agony, and yet he didn't want to put aside Neria enough to heal from it.

He opened his eyes and looked at his little girl. He would never fully recover, he thought, and yet he found himself saying to her hopeful golden eyes, "Yes, Ana, little pet. I will. It was just a little slip-up. I am sorry to have worried you."

His Ana left her chair to put her arms around his neck and Zevran again gasped against the pain. "Of course, Papà," she said. "Do not apologize." He wrapped his arms around her and closed his eyes.

Shartan hesitated, then came and dropped to one knee beside his father's chair to embrace both of them. "Be patient with yourself," he said, his head against his father's shoulder. "It will just take a little time."

Zevran kissed Surana's cheek and the top of Shartan's fair head and the pain abated. "You should take a little of this advice yourself," he told his son. "You work yourself too hard; I see this. If I do that again you must come practice your ice spells on me to make sure that I am not so lazy, yes?"

Shartan just gave a tired and rueful smile. He gripped Zevran's shoulder to stand, then patted his father and went back to his chair.


	3. Chapter 3

Zevran was walking out the door when Surana rushed up. "Could you also get some lyrium, please?"

"Lyrium? What for?"

"We're trying to continue Madre's work on the spell on Shartan."

"Tell him to also fetch some eye of newt and the blood of the innocent!" Shartan shouted from up the hall before letting out a noisy mad cackle.

Zevran laughed and Surana rolled her eyes. "He thinks that he is so funny."

"He is!" Zevran told his daughter before shouting back, "You don't have enough money for the blood! The Crows do not work for free!"

* * *

Zevran stood at the gate of the training yard and watched his two children, perched atop of the stone wall. Shartan's hands moved quickly as he spoke to Surana. A moment later they both turned to light and slipped into bird-form. Zevran felt his heart thud as they climbed into the air, one a crow, the other a kestrel, and he did not know which was which.

"Neria," Zevran murmured, "Our children are giving me cause for concern." He paused for a while, shading his eyes and trying to keep track of both dark spots in the air. "Also apparently your death has made me go crazy enough that I'm standing in the sun and talking to myself."

* * *

"Where did you learn to do that?" Zevran asked Shartan. Surana had fallen on the ground after turning back to her elf-form and her brother was helping her up.

"I dreamed of it for a while and then found that I could do it."

"In a dream?" Surana frowned. "From a demon?"

"Well, _so_ _far_ I haven't been struck by any mad desires for power, and I only _sometimes_ want to kill you, so I don't think I'm an abomination."

"The only other mage I have known to do that is Morrigan," Zevran told them.

Surana and Shartan shared a grave look.

* * *

Zevran was oiling his leathers on the porch when Shartan chuckled inside. "Why are you laughing?" he called into the house.

"Oh, Madre's grimoire."

"Hmm? What about it?"

"Oh, I can read twenty pages on how to drain the life from another mage and then turn the next one to find a little note about how to treat you. I just found a new one. She was so obviously crazy about you and so the formal way that she writes is so funny, especially when it's about my own Padre."

Zevran dropped the armor and went inside, wiping his hands on a rag. He looked over Shartan's shoulder. "Where?"

Shartan pointed, but the grimoire was written in a code made of three languages and Zevran knew only two. He shook his head. "Read it to me."

Shartan cleared his throat and began to blush but read smoothly, "The Dalish say that they are descended from the lords of the elves and this is something to bear in mind about your father. He is very obviously of better quality blood than most elves. Most elves are so subservient to the humans and while there may be days in your life where you will be forced to play this part, never forget that if the world had been different, you would have been the child of a mighty lord and a powerful mage. The humans should be bowing to you, not the other way around."

Zevran made a strangled sound. "She was insane!"

Shartan chuckled again and shook his head. "I don't know if I should let you talk about my madre that way."

Zevran pulled out the chair beside Shartan and sat. "I would like it if you were to teach me Arcanum, son. I want to read the other crazy things your madre writes."

"Of course. Though she put a blood spell on this book so that only those related to her by blood can open it. We'll help you any time you want to read."


	4. Chapter 4

The quill scratched the page and in the circle of the lamp's light there were three things: Surana, Neria's grimoire, and Surana's own grimoire. Zevran watched her copy words from one to the other.

"You will ruin your eyes, I am told, doing such fine work so late."

Wordless, she turned the light white through magic, her pen scratching even faster.

* * *

A moth hovered near to the campfire, then fluttered back when Zevran leaned in to baste the meat. The juices struck the coals and hissed.

"I feel that your mother and I have not prepared you well enough," he muttered.

Surana turned the page, and the paper shivered from her fingers' trembling. "Oh, I am not as good as either of you, but I'm sure that I'm better than most, yes?"

"No, I do not speak of knives and magic, Ana." He sat back on his heels and glowered at his daughter. "We sought a safe place to raise our children and I think this safety has made both you and Shartan adopt dangerous ideals. This will make you weak if you are not careful."

Surana smiled and he frowned deeper at this. "I am not going to _die,_ Papà."

"Yes," Zevran spat back. "Yes, you will. You will die and the more you fear this the quicker it will come. Do not act like some," he waved a hand dismissively, "some elven queen like your mamma would have you do. You must lie. Eat garbage with your hands. Use your beauty as a weapon. Kill the innocent. The moment that you hesitate to wonder if this is beneath you, or if it is _wrong_, this is the moment when your enemy will strike."

Surana's smile widened indulgently and she reached for his arm. Zevran twitched away from her and stood. "Papà," she said, and he shook his head sharply, walking out of the fire's circle of light. She closed her book and stood to follow him. "Padre. You are behaving as if you will not see me again. I will come _back_, you must know this. The Dalish will not keep me as a prisoner."

"You do not know this. When you lived in my house I could make a reasonable guess that you would live from one day to the next, but you cannot say that you will see me ever again, my little love."

* * *

The sound of bowstrings drawn grew thick in the trees and Zevran slowly stepped in front of Surana. His hands stayed by his side but his fingers arched open, prepared to fit around hilts. Around the campfire that evening, someone called them flat-ears and her father, who had never paid attention when someone called him knife-ears, glared.

Zevran put his hands around his daughter's head and bowed to touch her forehead to his, looking into the golden eyes that he had given her and hissing more quick instructions. She threw her arms around him and he held her tightly, grumbling the whole while, then left, pausing to look back once on the way.


	5. Chapter 5

"You mean you know all of those tricks with the knives and you don't know anything about the bow?" Narol hid his laughter poorly in his voice. He had lovely chestnut skin and short dark hair and black tattoos that went over his lips. "What if you needed to shoot something?"

Surana lifted her finger and a single lightning spark wandered from it to the middle of the target, where it dissipated in white smoke.

"We don't use magic to hunt," Narol said, still grinning. He handed her the bow and arrow.

He stepped up behind her. "No. Like this, flat-ears." He slid her fingers along the bowstring, nudged her back a little straighter. His body was warm in the shadows of the trees.

"Don't call me that." She let the arrow fly and it went wide of the target.

"Shouldn't I?" Narol was laughing again and went to retrieve the arrow. "Any of the da'len could have made that shot."

* * *

"'Tis worrisome that the rumors of your disappearances reach even me. Where do you go, then?"

"I hunt."

"Indeed? With all of the food that can be had there? What do you hunt?"

"My quarry."

"Oh, you think this _amusing_, do you? You should be mindful that you are yet new to the world of men and your secrets do not allow me to aid you."

"Dear mother, I am ever amused when you speak as if you are my elder."

* * *

Surana ran swiftly behind the hunters, ducking beneath the branches that flew by. She braced herself against a tree and panted. She grinned over her racing heart while watching Danan slit the doe's throat and ease her gently to the ground.

* * *

Surana's fist smacked into Narol's chestnut jaw and he stumbled back. "I said don't call me that!"

"Hold your temper, flat-ears!"

He dodged her second punch but she leapt at him and knocked him to the ground. "I have never bowed to the shemlen!" He reached for her waist to throw her off but she put her weight into his wrists and pinned him down, shocked by how easy it was.

"Get off!" He bucked and twisted his larger body but Surana countered every move and knocked him down each time.

Hands gripped her arms from behind, lifted her bodily away but she kicked off the ground and flipped away in a move that her father favored, landing messily on the ground distant from the new assailant.

"Peace, da'len," said Fenarian, his deep voice calm, his hands wide now that he did not touch her. Narol got to his feet, rubbing his jaw. "We do not strike our brothers."

"I am the daughter of a Grey Warden! My parents did not sacrifice so much to give me a home away from the shemlen so that I could be called _flat-ears_ by the elvhen!"

"Remember Vir Adahlen. Is this how you mean to honor Mythal? She who ended Elgar'nan's rage? I think that your meditations are not yet done."

"I—"

"No," said Narol. "It was my fault, hahren." He stepped forward and held out his hand to Surana. "Abelas, lethallan. I was wrong." He smiled and lifted his brows.

There was hardly a moment's hesitation before she clasped his wrist. "Abelas. I should not have struck you."

* * *

Light was fading in the clearing but Surana would study her mother's grimoire until she could see no longer. She brushed a blinking firefly from her hair and became aware of approaching footsteps, too heavy to be Dalish. Grimoire hid, she stood.

The flash of his hand over her magelight was blinding and she stepped back, closing her wavering connection to the fade.

"I said to stop! You wander too close to our camp. My clanmates will kill you for trespassing."

The man's hand fell and his head ducked down, eyes lifted to her face. He responded to her Antivan words with Antivan speech of his own, heavily accented with Fereldan tones. "You care so little for your brother as that? I find myself doubting."

When the hunters came, drawn by the flash of light, she lifted her hand and stayed their arrows. The man bowed deeply to Surana and then, head still bowed, moved away. His eyes did not stop watching her until the forest had swallowed him.


	6. Chapter 6

Shartan whooped and tossed Surana in the air when she came home and he wouldn't let her go until she wrestled with him. That ended with a humiliating loss, her face in the dirt, but at least he let her up afterwards. She told them about the man with Alistair's face and Padre argued that she needed to stay home now and not go back to her clan. She refused, and he was snappish all evening before retiring early.

* * *

"Does he seem… less patient to you?" Surana whispered to Shartan.

"Oh yes. He has gotten slowly worse since Madre's death. He stayed for your sake, you know."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't think that he intended to live past when Madre died. You have read what she has written about the spell on me, yes?" Surana nodded. "There is no such spell on you, as you know. I think that he intended for me to be an adult and to leave me behind when Madre's calling came. But then you came and, you know, he had to stay."

Surana was silent for a moment, looking at the hallway. "I can't imagine wanting someone so much that I would rather die than live without him. It must be a terrible fate for Padre. Would you want a love like that?"

"Madre wrote something about that. Did you read it?" Shartan stood and went to Surana's pack, sliding out their mother's heavy book. He sat on the ground and flipped through the pages. "Ah, yes, here it is:

"_Love is a trap that you must avoid. Your father and I both knew this. You may think that our long association is built on sentiment, but it is not so. We are both very powerful people and this is the only thing that allowed us to remain together and survive. Keep your attachments fluid and casual and you too, will survive, because you will not find anyone as powerful as you are who you can trust. Your entire life you will be hunted by the Chantry and sometimes the Crows and so you must be always willing to move on."_

"How cheerful."

"Yes, well, I laughed the first time that I read it, because…" Shartan turned a few more pages. "Yes, here it is. Five pages more, and she records the exact power needed to cast the spell to warm Padre's bath, and also a description of the herb that he likes in his porridge. Obviously no sentiment there at all." He laughed and shook his head. "No, her warning about the traps is a very valid one, but there's also the worry that if we fell into it, we could be stuck five years after still grieving like he is."

* * *

"You should not risk so much! I did not save your life so that you might throw it away for the sake of glory. You are as much of a fool as your father ever was, just now."

"Forgive me, Mother. I know that I tax your patience. Know that I am as cautious as I can manage."

"You are breaking promises that I made and I do not like it. I have said this and I say it again."

"I am sorry that I offend your honor so, but I cannot consider myself bound to a promise made on my behalf before my parents had yet lain together."

* * *

"No. Look." Surana jerked her wrist and it came free from Narol's grasp. "It isn't about how tightly you hold me. It's about the angle." She turned her head , her hair hushing against last year's leaves that softened the dirt, and adjusted his hand.

She didn't realize how close he was until she looked back up and his lips brushed over hers, his eyes drifted shut. She twitched a little at the unexpectedness of it and was just starting to respond when he pulled away, eyes widening.

"Abelas," Narol said as he rolled back on his heels and stood. "Abelas, I…" He rubbed his hands over his face as if he could wipe away his vallaslin. He shook his head and left on fleet steps, leaving Surana to slowly sit up and touch her dirty fingers to her mouth.

* * *

The falcon threw out his wings and spiraled in a display for her. Surana landed. Magic burst against her skin; she spun to see the bird turn into the beautiful man with Alistair's face.

They stared at each other. His lips parted. "Ana, please." Her eyes snapped wide and she turned, pouring her body into a halla's shape.

They raced, she on untried hooves and he behind her, a stag with dark and shaggy fur. She leapt over a fallen log and stumbled, hearing the stag bellow as she went to her knees. She jerked upward quickly, reared back and—yes, her antlers were now tangled in branches. She thrashed a bit then stopped, huffing through her nostrils and feeling quite the fool.

He stood before her in man-shape again, but not too close, and after a hesitation she changed back as well. "Ah!" Her hair was jerked behind her, some of it ripped away, tangled in the branches now instead. He stepped forward; she twitched back, eyes wary. He opened his hands in a gesture of peace and very slowly he reached up to free her. This done, he moved back again.

"How do you know my name?" she finally asked, raking her fingers back over her sore scalp. She felt like a wild thing with knotted hair and rough leather clothes.

"Through the, the… ah, forgive me," he answered, his voice as gentle as his hands had been, and he switched to the Fereldan tongue. "Through the binding that was done between your brother and I."

"You can use this to watch my family?" Surana's voice lifted with accusation. He sighed and ran a hand through his own hair, making it most becomingly tousled. He was dressed very fine, in dark cloth obviously cut specifically for his form.

"'Tis entirely possible that I had nothing to do with that spell," he spoke as if frustrated. "Have you considered this? I was but a child at the time of its casting, surely too young to have a hand in its devising."

They stared at each other for a moment. The man sighed again and crouched comfortably on the ground, the stance wild and incongruous with his fine clothing. "You have made this so very difficult," he said ruefully. "My lovely plans to introduce myself in the village marketplace were reduced to tatters when you became Dalish and so very difficult to find."

"Why are you looking for me?"

In answer to this he just smiled and tilted his head a little, looking up at her from his place nearer to the ground. Surana had to swallow once and his smile widened. "May I introduce myself properly? I would have done so before now had I the chance. I am called Cavan."

"If I make to leave now, Cavan, will you follow?"

His smile faded. "If you do not wish it, I will not."

"Then do not follow me."


	7. Chapter 7

"Stop that." Surana said this in Ferelden. The scent of Cavan's roasting hares mingled with that of the campfire and Narol and his sister were laughing on the other side of it. "It is disturbing that you try your father's trick and it will not work when you use it."

Cavan's dark brows lifted and he looked at her openly again. "My father's trick?" He broke his evening's silence with those words. "I am doing something that my father did?" He spread his hands and glanced down at himself. "Is it how I am sitting?"

Surana flicked her fingers at him, her lips in a tight line. "This silence of yours. It will not work for you as it worked for him."

Cavan smiled for her, his pale eyes shining, his jaw strong, his nose… _stop, stop thinking such things_, Surana chided herself. "I thought that my father was a boisterous man. This was not always so?"

Surana only frowned at him. Narol was tapping the side of her boot in a familiar and idle way.

"Mercy, Ana, truly I have no knowledge of what you might mean," Cavan said when she didn't respond, his smile fading a little. "Your brother dreams of a shining and laughing man. I know nothing of who he honestly was, nor how he behaved toward you. Indeed I was not told that this man 'Alistair' who I dreamt of was my own father until I was nearly a man myself."

He leaned toward her, his smile turning wicked. "_Please_, Surana," he said, the words slow and deep and her belly burned while Narol's hand tightened around her ankle. "Will you tell me what I have done? I know almost nothing of him. Was I being shining and golden like him in that moment?"

Surana looked into his yellow eyes, her breath quick, her lips parting a little. She reached for Narol's hand and wound her fingers through his. "No," she said. "No, I think not."

* * *

Surana groaned when someone nudged up against her while she was sleeping. She cracked one bleary eye and found her brother's face a hand's-width away from hers. "Wha.."

"Shh. Go back to sleep." So she rolled over and did so, his shoulder digging into her back.

* * *

Shartan and her clanmates were delighted to meet each other, though she did have to punch him when he said, "She's told you she's _good_ at sparring? Hah!" Of course he dodged the punch, which made them laugh more.

Later they walked through the forest, their steps crushing plants that scented the air sharply. "So…" Shartan said, eyes cast sidelong at her. She tensed. "That Narol, hmm? He is very nice to look at."

This time she punched him, hard. He yelped and clutched his arm. "Hessarian's mercy!" She just glared. "Peace! Maker, it was just the _one time_ with Visto!"

"I had already kissed him!"

"He was too old for you!"

She made to punch him again but he bowed away this time and caught her wrist. "So what about that Uncle Alistair's son?" he said in a sudden loud voice. "Not to obviously change the topic, but have you seen him again? By answering you are agreeing not to hit me anymore."

Surana rolled her eyes and shook her hand out of his. "Yes. He says that his name is Cavan." She slipped beneath a mossy branch, swaying along a deer-trail. "He says that he can see your dreams."

Shartan stopped moving behind her and she turned. He was a little pale, his eyes widened just slightly. "See my dreams?"

"Yes. I—I'm sorry, Shartan." She reached for his arm. He took a breath and shook his head. "Perhaps it goes both ways?" she said, brows lifted. "Perhaps you can watch him, too?"

"See his dreams?"

Surana nodded. Shartan's eyes went even wider and then he started gasping with hysterical laughter. He covered his face with his hands. "By all the gods!" he said. "That—Maker's balls, I thought something was wrong with me!"

"Wrong with you?" Surana frowned and tried to pry his hands open by his wrists.

"He dreams about kissing you," said Shartan. "And lately? He dreams about…" he shuddered and looked away, his face deeply red. "…I don't even want to say it. I'm able to make myself wake up if I start dreaming about you." He stepped back and folded his arms. "My mind is scarred. I mean, if I had any interest in women this had it killed for good." He shuddered again. "If you see him again, stab him in the balls. I'd feel a lot better. I… and now I'm just babbling."

"Yes!" Surana interrupted. She had her arms folded around herself too. "Yes, never talking about that again, _ever._ Right. Yes. Not that it's your fault." She cleared her throat. "What else does he dream about?"

Shartan sat down in the middle of the path and started fumbling with his pack. He drew out a winebottle and held it up triumphantly. "From that good pressing six years ago! Mind-cleansing delightfulness." He pulled the cork out with his teeth as Surana sat down before him. The path was so narrow that they were being pushed in on both sides by undergrowth, only half of their faces showing. He took three long swallows and passed it to her.

"Let me think. I don't properly know which dreams are his," he said as she began to drink. "No doubt any about women. Many about people that I don't recognize. When we were very little, I used to dream in a language that I never heard while I was awake. Flying dreams. Sometimes…" his voice trailed off for a moment as he took the bottle back. "Sometimes I dream of very beautiful places that I do not understand. Gardens with flowers that I have never seen. Music… oh the music, Ana…" He stared into the bushes.

Surana nudged his foot and he startled to look back at her then grinned crookedly. "We need to sever the spell," she said.

"Yes," he answered, but wistfully he said it.


	8. Chapter 8

Slow were Surana's breaths, slipping in and out along her cracked lips. _The Earth wept tears and these became the sea. Mythal walked through the Earth's tears to set her foot on the ruined land._

Footsteps. Surana opened her eyes to see Alistair's son and perhaps he was a vision, gone many months and come to her now in her meditations. _Mythal placed her hand on Elgar'nan's brow and his rage was ended._

"You are a god," she whispered to the vision who was Cavan.

He crouched before her, his forearms on his knees, and watched her with steady yellow eyes. "I am Urthemiel."

_By Mythal's touch on his brow Elgar'nan knew how his anger had led him astray._ "You killed so many."

"I was blighted and driven mad." There was nothing more beautiful than his voice, deep and steady. She found her eyes drifting shut at the peace in his words. "Your mother freed me."

Her eyes remained closed. _Elgar'nan in his power convinced the Sun to be gentle with the Earth. _Her breath passed slowly over the cracks in her lips, the tiny twinge of pain there marking time. _Together Elgar'nan and Mythal returned life to all that had lived._

"Surana." Her eyes opened again and the god Urthemiel had his hand opened to her, berries in his palm—strange berries, blue-black and wrinkled. "You are weakened. Will you eat?"

"No." He was slow to close his fingers over the offering. "It is forbidden."

He shifted and she watched him, her lids heavy, her body still. He sat upon the grass, his knee a hand's-width from hers. "Might I stay with you then?"

Surana's eyes fell shut. _Mythal stepped from the sea of tears in the moment of Elgar'nan's pride._ "This is also forbidden," she breathed.

"And will you allow it anyway?" His quiet words caressed her as the breeze did. The air brought the scent of crushed leaves and old leather and the feathers of birds. The sting of her lips marked time. _Elgar'nan's vengeance was terrible and by the touch of Mythal's hand it was stayed._

"Yes, I will."

* * *

Surana breathed slowly again. Needles slid into her eyelid. Blood ran down beside her nose. Needles pricked her forehead. Pain bloomed beneath her skin like a flower, like the roots of a greedy plant, growing from her eyes to her temples to curl around her head and thrust down her spine. Needles dug into the sensitive corner of her mouth.

"It is finished," said the Keeper. Surana opened her bloody eyes to the smiling faces of her clan, her family. "Well done, lethallan."


	9. Chapter 9

_AN:_ _Rating just went up because somebody has a potty mouth._

* * *

That evening just as Surana was closing the door to the aravel a small brown bird fluttered in. She turned to find Cavan sitting on the bed. "Let me see," he said, standing, moving toward her. The aravel was too big for him and he had to duck his head. He _loomed_ over her in the small space and she backed away. White light sprung up near her head.

"The Keeper will know that you are here by your magic!"

"She will not. Let me heal you." His hands raised to Surana's face.

"No!" Surana gripped his wrists. "Stop!"

He looked down at her with his yellow eyes, his black hair fallen over his forehead, and Surana was suddenly aware that she had never touched him before.

"This is _so difficult_," he said after a moment, low and tense.

Facts: Cavan's skin was warm and his wrists were very large. His bones were solid and she could not reach her fingers all of the way around but there were small hairs under her fingers. Another fact: obviously Surana was going_ insane._

"I should have returned home yesterday," he was saying, his voice still low and frustrated. "You were falling over two days ago and today I was forced to linger as I watched them put needles in your face. Why did you not heal yourself? You have the ability. Has no one taught you its use? Shartan knows of it." There was a slight tremor in his muscles.

"Of course I know the spell! The pain is part of what the Dalish must endure."

"But _not you,_ Surana." His eyes closed and his hands fisted and opened over his caught wrists. He made a low sound in his throat. His eyes opened and he bent down further to touch his lips to her mouth.

Her mouth was the only part of her face that didn't hurt. His kiss was kind and slow and Surana stopped breathing. It was over swiftly; he crouched further down to put his head against the door above her shoulder, his breath on her skin. "I must go," he said in a pleading voice.

"Shem," she said, stunned, because it was the only feeling that she could put a word to. His wrists were still in her hands. He gave a brief little puff of laughter and turned his head to kiss the side of her neck. The feel of his mouth curled up over her head and down the entire side of her body and she shivered as she broke out in goosebumps.

"Highever is sacked and Amaranthine will fall next due to my foolishness over a girl who hates me and calls me a shem." His hand worked loose from hers and fell to touch her belly, just over where her stomach was twisting in knots.

He dropped to a knee in front of her and stole her hands to kiss each palm once. He reached for the door behind her then and the moment it was the slightest bit open he turned to a tiny whirring bird and was gone.

* * *

"Yes. It is said that there is a war in Ferelden. I believe that it has been invaded by Orlais again, yes?"

"Yes," confirmed Shartan. "I cannot say why they did this, but I believe that the northern part of Ferelden has fallen."

Surana rocked back and forth in Madre's chair. Padre appeared to be better now, sitting in the sun with the wine-bottle half-empty. He had loved her vallaslin, boasting to the workers about his daughter who could endure tattoos on her eyelids.

"He kissed me," Surana said darkly. Shartan looked sharply up at her and Padre raised his eyes to the ceiling, muttering to himself.

"My treasure, my little pet," he finally said. "Please won't you invite him home to meet your papà? Perhaps the archdemon should at least tell me what his intentions are."

"You mean you will beat him a little."

"Well, yes, if it weren't for him surely your mother wouldn't have needed to die early from her filthy darkspawn blood."

Surana sighed and tipped her head back against the wood. "He's a shem."

They both laughed. "Ah yes, this devourer of life, his ears aren't pointy enough for you," said Padre. "Your dear mother would be proud. Your racism exceeds even hers, I think. If this is what makes you stay away from him, it will be good enough for me, I say."

"Shem, elf," said Shartan, "they die and fuck the same."

Zevran grinned with pride, the wrinkles in the corners of his eyes gathering. "My boy. He killed three Templars while you were away, you know."

"Did you?" Surana tilted her head to look over at her brother, barefoot on the floor. "Very nice!"

He made a mock-bow. "I only vomited once and they had lyrium on them. A triumph altogether, or so I am told."


	10. Chapter 10

"So this Narol likes you but he didn't consider you old enough until you got those tattoos, yes?"

Surana nodded. They were seated with their backs against Shartan's headboard and each with a wineglass.

"But you don't know if you like _him_ so much…"

"Yes."

"Drink more. Drink faster." Shartan leaned over to fetch the wine-bottle again. "You think too much. This is a terrible thing for you. And for me."

He tipped up her glass against her mouth and she gulped quickly to keep from having it spill, a sin for such a fine wine. He spoke again while refilling her cup. "So you came to me to ask about what to _do_ about this boy? Why is this a question?"

Surana sighed and took another long drink while Shartan watched her with narrowed eyes. "The bastard shem," she said, rolling her eyes up to the ceiling. "The archdemon shem. He is not so terrible to look at either. He is… interesting. For a shem."

"So bed one, then bed the other." Shartan settled back further against his bed with a self-satisfied sigh. "Do you have any more difficult problems? Apparently I am very good at this."

"I cannot just," Surana spluttered, "_bed_ a Dalish! They do not do this! We would not, I mean, yes, I am a Dalish. But they would never be so casual!"

"_What?_ Why would you even want to live with them?"

"Someone had to think of our future. You weren't going to! Things will not always be so easy for us. I did this for both of us, Shartan, you idiot."

"Mmm." Shartan took a long, slow sip, thoughtful, but this ended when he looked at her sidelong. He gave a quick laugh. "You're still a _virgin!_ No, now I understand the trouble. You're stuck up with those Dalish and you're twenty-one years old and saying things such as, 'he likes me' and 'but perhaps I do not like him' and—" It ended there with Surana shoving him out of the bed. Shartan crowed in laughter, stumbling to his feet and balancing his cup.

"It is so easy for you to say!" Surana said hotly, her skin gone dusky with a blush. "I could get with child, and then where would I be?"

Shartan's chortles slowly died down. He made a gesture of peace and gingerly sat again, his wine-cup well out of her reach. "So you get with child." Surana frowned severely at him but he lifted his arm to tuck it around her shoulders. "You must know that if such a thing were to happen Padre and I would take care of you." He smiled as her frown eased a little. "So have a baby. I certainly won't ever get any. Have five and give three of them to me! But not straight away if you can help it. I'm too young to be a papà."

Surana lifted her chin and leaned her head back against Shartan's arm. She took another drink and held out her cup to be filled up again. "Still, I cannot believe you would tell me to bed the shem. His dreams, they are… bad, you say?"

"I have learned how to walk away from them in the Fade if I need to," said Shartan, leaning away just a little to set the bottle back on his bedside table. "I do not see such things anymore. And.." he lifted his shoulder, shifting Surana's head. "His other dreams, they are not so terrible."


	11. Chapter 11

Cavan ducked his head to study Surana's vallaslin. He smelled sharply of lyrium and a red scar sliced through his eyebrow and over his forehead.

"How did you get that?"

"'Twas a chevalier's blade." His yellow eyes dropped from her forehead to her eyes. "Is this concern for me I see in your face, or do I mistake it with concern for your brother?"

"Why was a chevalier cutting you?" she asked instead and his smile widened, eyes creasing.

"They came for Denerim and I drove them off. We have retaken Amaranthine but Gwaren has fallen. Does it please you, Ana, to know that I fight for Ferelden?"

"You must be careful," is the only answer she gave.

* * *

The doe was pierced and fled, leaping down stones with the arrow wagging in her haunches. The trail was lost and Surana took to her kestrel-form and flew. The doe raced through a clearing some distance away and leapt high to find Surana already there, knives in hand.

Cavan came then after his months away as she stood waiting beside her kill. He grinned at Surana and lifted her deer, rolling the carcass up over his shoulders. The god followed her along narrow paths back to the camp and her clan-mates did not question his presence. _The Shem_ was turned into his title instead an insult.

* * *

The bird's wings were sharp little snaps between their faces and Narol pulled away from Surana. A footfall crushed leaves behind him.

"Shem," said Narol. Surana just looked over her clanmate's shoulder at Cavan and met his yellow eyes. The air felt thick like just before a rainstorm.

"I'll… go, then." Narol glanced at Surana then did so, climbing out of the little hollow with boots sure and turning on the stones.

"He'll listen to us," Surana said, low, watching Narol. Her brows knotted together.

"He will not." Surana watched Cavan's eyes then instead. He started to smile, and the shifting of his features made her breath stutter.

He took two steps closer and she held her ground. Her frown deepened.

"Shem," Cavan said. His body melted into light and reformed, and there stood an elf with black hair and yellow eyes, his mouth no higher than her forehead. He closed the space between them and bowed his head to touch his lips to her earlobe.

She heard her breath come quick. "How…" she paused, closing her eyes to collect herself. "…how do you know these forms?"

"So long I lived in the Fade." He drew his mouth along the rim of her ear and she trembled. His hands, his right-sized hands came to rest on her waist. "I know of many things, Surana." His mouth then closed on the very tip of her ear and he suckled her skin.

The tiny wet sounds made her put her hands on his chest. That his chest was the size of any elf's broke something inside of her and she leaned up against him. He touched his tongue just beneath her ear; she whimpered and turned her face into his neck. Her mouth pressed his skin; he shuddered everywhere.

But then he moved away, hands on her ribs steady and she felt the pulse of her own heartbeat beneath them as they shifted again, grew larger, even steadier.

She covered her mouth with her own to catch her gasping breath as he crouched in front of her, human again, his knees spread to be on either side of her calves. "I am yet a shem." His hands drifted from her ribs down over her hips and finally over the outside of her legs. "'Tis certain that I am entirely beneath you, lovely Surana, but I was not given a choice in the race of my parents." She felt calluses on his fingers as he slowly drew them up to just under the hem of her leather armor. "Hate me for some other reason, for I can do nothing about that one."

Surana dropped to kneel between his knees and he used this motion to slide his hands up to the skin of her thighs. She studied his eyes again, his pupils dark and wide within the yellow irises, then lengthened her body to lift up and kiss him. Cavan's legs shook when she stroked her tongue over his; he took her with him as he toppled to the ground.

* * *

"What is the meaning of this?" Cavan traced a fingertip over Surana's vallaslin, to arch from one of her brows to the other. "These markings have a story, do they not?"

"They honor the goddess of protection, Mythal." Cavan's eyes flashed briefly when Surana said this.

"They are beautiful." Cavan's expression eased into another smile. "Tell me of this goddess you honor."

"The sun loved the earth and he bowed to touch her," Surana said. Cavan's mouth was on her shoulder and her eyes closed. "Where they touched a son was born, Elgar'nan. His parents loved him and the earth gave him many living things. These pleased Elgar'nan so much that the sun became jealous and burned them all to ashes." Cavan buried his hand in her hair and tasted her throat. She stopped, breath caught beneath his lips.

"Do continue," he murmured against her skin.

"The earth wept and so the sea was made. Elgar'nan, in his rage for his mother," she stopped again, breathing thickly, and he lifted his head to just kiss her cheek. He rested beside her and watched her eyes. "..in his rage for his mother," she continued, "wrestled with the sun and threw him down."

She took a slow breath. "But nothing would grow on the earth again until Mythal came from the sea. She touched Elgar'nan's brow and soothed his rage. The sun was returned and together they returned life to all things on the earth."

"A wise goddess then," said Cavan, following the lines down her eyelids so that she had to close them.

"Yes."

"Perhaps she was beautiful also," he said next, then covered her mouth with his own once more.


	12. Chapter 12

"Let me take your pack."

The voice sent prickles up Surana's spine. Her pack was hot and sticky in the northern jungle and she slid her gaze sideways, up to Cavan.

"Why do you do that?" she asked as if they were continuing a conversation that they left off months ago, when he'd last appeared. "I am strong. I can carry my own pack and my own prey."

"You could not have carried the doe." He reached for the strap of her pack but did not touch it, hand hovering. "And what use would you say this big shem body has if not to carry for you?"

"My—"

"Let him carry it, da'len," interrupted the Keeper. "Rocahre is tiring."

Cavan shouldered Surana's burden and she climbed the aravel. "Might I aid you and Rocahre also?" he asked the Keeper as Surana lifted her hands. Vines crawled from between the trees; the halla started moving again when the space opened.

"No, shem. This is something you cannot do."

* * *

Cavan was absolutely still, the muscles of his arm hard around Surana's waist. She was in his lap and impaled on him and he would not move until she gave her word. His belly trembled; sweat rolled down it. He tried to kiss her when he could but she was tossing her head, tugging her hair pasted to her back. His fingers, dripping motes of white and blue, dipped between their bodies; he stroked so slowly up and down her center.

"_Go_," she choked out. He forced her hips down and thrust up as she writhed and clenched around him. His head fell back and he gave a loud cry of joy; light spiked from between his black lashes.

* * *

Sweat tickled down the back of Surana's neck. Her head was bowed over her empty wooden bowl; her eyes were slid to the person on the bench beside her.

"You do not _mind_ that the shem follows us?"

"No, I do not mind. He is a friend to us, da'len." The Keeper paused, her eyes on the light-shattered water through the trees. "But do not bear him a child. This would shame you and all of us."

"No. No, never."

* * *

Surana flew high and southward, sharp eyes watching the closed-in paths that her clan would travel as they moved again. Nothing was in the sky with her. She tucked her wings in close and landed, the tree a blur of green before her talons closed around a branch.

A wolf pack was napping beneath her. Time passed as her keen eyes studied them. The sensation of someone watching her back grew so keen that she whipped her head around to preen her feathers between her shoulders.

When she raced back to her clan, it was on paws instead of wings.

* * *

"They said that there is still a big war in Orlais and Ferelden." Narol eased his pack to the ground and Surana opened it, taking out the packets.

"Did you find good trade?"

"Yes. Good coin, too." Narol crouched beside her and helped her sort it out in silence for a moment, and then—"You are very worried about your shem? How long has it been now?"

"Oh, a year and a half, I think? And he is not my shem."

* * *

Shartan fingered a grape between his fingers while speaking with one of his men and a kestrel falcon swooped around them, crying _kee-kee-kee-kee!_

"Maybe tomorrow then," he said and the man nodded.

When Shartan returned to the house Surana flung herself off the porch at him.

"What is this?" he demanded, squeezing her tight enough to be annoying. "Kisses? Ah, girl's lips all over my face. Why are you kissing me?"

"I was worried about you, but you are fine!" Surana pushed at his shoulders. "Let me down I am done now. I said let me down!" She kicked him in the shin and he dropped her.

"What is this, no love for papà?" She launched herself at Zevran next. He laughed and wound his arms around her. "You always stay away so long." He pulled away, studied her face, then pulled her back again to push her head against his shoulder. Shartan was struck with the contrast of her hair and his—Zevran's was growing so pale. "Stay longer this time, my little treasure."

"I will, papà."

"Why were you worried about me?" Shartan had climbed the porch and was leaning against the doorway.

"Cavan hasn't come for a very long time and even my clan heard of the war," Surana said from on Zevran's shoulder. "I thought perhaps something awful had happened, but perhaps he just has moved on from me."

"No, I do not think so. He still dreams of you. And I still can't punch him," Shartan sighed. He pushed away from the door to kiss the back of Surana's head. "You truly stayed away too long this time, idiot. If you try to run off too soon I will chase you and force you back."

Surana grinned.

* * *

Surana was in the bath over a month later when Zevran answered a knock at the door.

"Good evening." The man on the other side of the door was just exquisite, and Zevran had appreciated many men in his lifetime. There was something in the straight set of his shoulders, his fine clothes, the clean line of his jaw and his wide yellow eyes… "Is Surana at home?" The lines of the man's face sharpened in Zevran's eyes and he saw the echo of Alistair in him, laid beneath Morrigan's coloring. The Crow smiled.

"Of course, my friend. Will you come in?" And the moment this Cavan stepped close enough, Zevran's fist pounded into his face, crunching the bones of his nose satisfyingly into his head.

Cavan's head whipped back and cracked against the doorframe. He ducked in time for Zevran's next punch, which landed lighter on the side of his head. "You son of a bitch," hissed the elf, backing away. "The only reason you live is for my son's sake."

Cavan slowly straightened, his yellow eyes narrowed like a snake's. White light fell over him and his nose straightened, the bleeding stopped just a moment past when it began.

"Zevran Arainai," he said, his beautiful voice smooth. "'Tis a pleasure indeed to have met you at last."


	13. Chapter 13

"You are a Teryn." Surana had her arms folded and her hip cocked. Cavan nodded, his voice soft.

"Technically it is pronounced 'Teyrn."

Surana shook her head. "You are the Teyrn of Gwaren and you did not think to tell me this!"

"I was not a Teyrn when last I saw you." Cavan pulled a chair from the table and sat, his pale eyes going through black lashes as he looked up at her.

"Then what were you?"

"Only a General." Surana threw up her hands as he said this. "I should not have come the last time but I could not stay away from you for so long." He paused, watching the line of her back when she turned. "I have _missed_ you so."

"You have missed me so, you say this, and yet you want me to go to Ferelden to make you into a King. Shall I stay in the alienage while I am there?"

Cavan stood swiftly and stepped behind her. His hands opened and closed and then he drifted the barest edge of his palms down the outside of her arms. She tossed her head but did not entirely pull away when he bent to set his mouth to her ear.

"When I am made King," he murmured, his voice a low music, "there will _be no more alienages."_

* * *

"It is because he says that he needs someone who can verify that he is of the Theirin bloodline."

"And our word will matter, will it?" Shartan was fingering the chain at his neck.

"I do not know. He says that it will because I am the daughter of their hero." Surana shifted and pressed her feet into the cushions of the couch. She watched Zevran at the other end. "What shall I say, Padre?"

Shartan pulled out Alistair's amulet, his thumb going over the worn design on its face. It was Shartan that Zevran watched.

* * *

"If he hurts you I will kill him," Shartan said. Surana pushed out of her brother's embrace and punched him.

"That would kill you too."

Shartan sighed. "I was creating an atmosphere of familial loyalty and you ruined it like you ruin everything."

Cavan took three long strides across the porch and put his hand on Surana's arm. "One moment," he said with a bow of his head for Shartan as he drew her away.

"Zevran cannot change his shape!" he whispered.

"Yes?" Surana answered, glancing over at her Padre who was bent over a pack. "And?"

"The landsmeet is in two weeks. We need to go on wings."

"Go before us and stall them then. If I am to go without him, then I do not go at all."

Cavan loomed over her, but his glance fell back to pass over Shartan, who was watching them, and Zevran, who was not. His gaze shifted back to Surana. He took her face in his hands and kissed her brow, the arching lines of her vallaslin.

He bent down to look into her eyes better. "You will go safely on this journey then and meet me unharmed in Ferelden."

She hesitated before nodding. Her arms folded and she did not touch him.

* * *

…_so while I do record the basics of Blood Magic for you, I do not wish for you to practice this art. It goes without saying that you should evade and even kill the Templars when they come for you, but if you are overwhelmed, do not be so willing to embrace death before surrender. The Towers have Enchanters who could teach you much and I have made the acquaintance of many mages who later earned partial freedom. Should you be captured, you can always choose death later if you wish it so badly. Death only comes once. You must endeavor to make it a death of your choosing instead of one forced upon you. Remember, in the Tower…_

A hand shut the grimoire in Surana's lap. The ship rocked around them as Padre slid the book into her pack. He put his mouth beside her ear. "Do not be so eager to draw attention to yourself, my little treasure," he breathed.

* * *

The wood of the ship groaned through the night. Someone across the hold snored beneath this. Surana slept silently nearby.

Zevran remembered waking to movement in his room as Neria slept on beside him. A small weight bowed the foot of their bed and then a small body had crept between them. Surana had tucked herself against Zevran, her knees digging into his hip.

"What is this?" he had whispered, or something like it, and she had answered, "I woke up and I missed you, papà, please?" She had fallen back to sleep, a hot and sticky little bundle pressed to his side.

Zevran shifted closer to his baby now, her tattoos erased in the shadows, and did not sleep until his hand was resting securely on her side.

* * *

_AN: My RL obligations are slowly easing up! Thank you so much for reading, even those of you who don't review or anything! I'm just so pleased that you like Zevran and his demented offspring! And for those who have reviewed I am giving extra sloppy kisses! WIN!_


	14. Chapter 14

"Is this why the man speaks Antivan with such a terrible accent?"

"No. He had not spoken Antivan aloud before the first time that he met me." Surana paused, bowing her head as Zevran gathered more of her hair from the wind. She was seated before him to the aft of the ship and he would be braiding the auburn locks, if he could win them from the breeze. "And he was very young when they left Orlais. He was in the wilds to the south of Ferelden after this. What are you going to do with it?"

"Ferelden women wear their hair to fit under helms. Just two braids, I think, coiled." He drew a part down her scalp, gently untangling when the wind blew her hair upward again. The little strands whipped hard against the toughened backs of his hands.

"How terribly _plain! _I do not like this idea at all."

"On you? You could make baldness look lovely, my little one. And I think that your hair so long is a danger anyway in battle. Now tell me how this war started, or at least what it was that he said."

"Again?"

"Tell me." The ship tipped deeper to the left and Zevran moved his hands with her head, braiding smoothly through it.

"There was fighting in the lords…"

"The Bannorn, is how it is said." Zevran watched one of the sailors climb netting, probably too high up to hear them, though one could never tell with the wind.

"The Bannorn, yes. The Queen fell to an illness and could not rule, and there was a great argument in this Landsmeet of theirs about who should follow her, and so the fighting."

"I never did like this Landsmeet business of Ferelden's. I felt that they should resolve matters more honestly, like in Antiva City." The braid had reached the middle of Surana's back. He pulled out his small dagger and sliced through the length that remained. She stiffened.

"Did you just cut my hair?" Strands of auburn blew along the breeze to catch against railing or be cast into the ocean.

"It was too long. It was not safe. I told you this."

"_Padre."_

"I am your papà. You must listen to me if you are to be kept safe. Your hair is not as important as your life, my treasure." He bound the tail of the braid with a little strip of leather. "So this was when Orlais struck."

Surana's shoulders were stiff between his knees. "This does not mean that you can cut my hair as you like."

"I could leave the other half long if you like." Zevran smiled, feeling the creases on his face deepen. "Anything for you, my dear."

Surana remained stiff for a little while and silent. Zevran waited, the wind whistling loud over their ears. "So, you know this," she finally said with a wave of her hand when she had forgiven him. "Cavan says that he joined the army and when Denerim was falling he rallied the troops. He says that he is good at it and many things because he is so old. It was around then that Anora began recovering and they met, I believe."

She stopped again when his comb became tangled in her hair, but he was gentle and soon she continued. "I do not understand this part, but she has made him her General here, possibly because he is so good?"

"Possibly," Zevran murmured, his fingers in the plait.

"So he was gone for a very long time then, you remember, when I worried? Well yes, that was only a few months ago." Her shoulders stiffened as he sliced cut her hair on the other side. "I am still not happy with you, Padre."

"Somehow I shall make it up to you. So this was when the Orlesians were beaten out of Ferelden."

"Yes and it took so long because he was invading Orlais." He started coiling her hair up. "Papà… was, was this a bad idea?"

Zevran watched her hair, darker than her mother's, as he tucked one plait into a sleek knot on the right. "Do you trust him?"

"No, I don't think that I do."

"Good." He twisted up the other braid. "I think that this is a good idea, my treasure." The knot secured, he coaxed her head back against his knee and looked down at her fretful face. He smiled at her and brushed over the lines of her tattoos with his thumb. "This Teyrn, this General who has sacked Val Royeaux, he is chasing you still, yes? I think that it is a very good idea to go and find out what truths he has been telling you and what lies. Perhaps you will even discover the spell on Shartan. Do not forget that your mother and I already defeated this Cavan once. You and I can do it again if we need to, yes?"

The crease between her brows softened and she closed her eyes. "Yes."

* * *

_AN: a billion thanks to valiasedai for her beta work! Go check her out! She also writes mages and one of them gets up to sexy tiems with Duncan. YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO._


	15. Chapter 15

The wind changed and Surana stumbled. Zevran took a deep and noisy breath then let it go in a burst of laughter.

"Now that, that glorious stench, it makes me feel young again!"

"What _is _it?"

"That would be the smell of wet dogs, if I am not mistaken." Zevran grinned and slung his arm around Surana's neck as they walked up the street. "With a touch of garbage, I believe. Ah, now it makes me think of your mother when she was young and the games we played!"

"Oh, Papà, I am sorry." She put her arm around his waist. He scowled at nothing.

"Why do you and your brother always do this? The woman has been dead for many years now. You would think that I have turned into pining old widow doting on my cats with the way you two behave."

* * *

Surana stood with her head held high as Zevran flattered the guard. The Fereldan words, spoken by natives, raced around her and her mind chased after them just as swiftly.

"Wait here," the guard said at last. "I'll see what the Prince has to say about this."

Zevran leaned gracefully up against the wall while Surana stood with shoulders set. "_Prince_ Cavan," she said eventually in an undertone.

Zevran studied the windows of the palace. "He does seem to pick up the impressive titles like toys, doesn't he?"

* * *

The door was pressed shut and Cavan moved on long legs to sit beside Surana, his smile broad. "The journey was not too difficult, I hope?"

"There was a man on the ship who wanted to punish the Dalish elf for his missing knife," answered Zevran from his place beside the window. He peered out with his arms folded. "We were able to kill him without much of a fuss."

"Good." Cavan glanced at Zevran and then reached out to touch the end of Surana's braid.

"Your highness," she said firmly. He laughed and leaned forward to kiss her hair.

"I'll keep you safe from the Chantry. They do not know that you are a mage, nor do they know that I am one. Keep your magic discreet and you can be confident that they'll not know you for what you are." Cavan's thumb touched the point of Surana's ear. "'Tis to our benefit to keep this so, for now."

With Cavan's hand on her ear, his fingers in her hair, Surana stole a glance to Zevran, who was frowning.

* * *

Something brushed Surana's mouth and her dreams were pierced by this. She jerked away with a gasp but when her eyes opened, she saw Cavan smiling at her in the shadows. "'Tis only I," he whispered. "I've missed you!" His thumb traced over her mouth again. "Might I kiss you, lovely Ana, or does our long parting mean that I should to start at the beginning again? I will do so, should you need it."

Surana's hands, warm from sleep, lifted from the bedding to touch his face, her fingers in his hair. His smile widened further. "You are a prince now."

"This happened while you were coming. 'Tis a new thing. I don't…" Cavan sighed and turned his head to kiss the inside of her wrist. "Those things do not matter to me, not like you, dear Surana."

Surana studied his eyes, faintly yellow even in the grey of the night, then drew him down to her.

* * *

Cavan dipped his head; his eyes were intent and distant upon Surana before his gaze touched Zevran. His sharp glance moved on and his head lifted again.

"My Lords and Ladies of the Landsmeet!"

The greatest hall in Ferelden was ugly, all grey stone and old wood. The golden throne contrasted as a thing of beauty, as did the silver Queen who sat upon it. Surana studied her, tried to reconcile her mother's anger against the dignified and polite woman that she had already shared a meal with.

The nobility watched Cavan; even his raised voice was deep and gentle and Surana became aware of something happening just out of her reach, like a distant sound felt instead of heard. It made her body feel vaguely too tight, made her feel as if she was being watched from beyond the Veil. She glanced at her father; he met her gaze and then nodded toward Cavan.

"…Surana Arainai, daughter of the Hero Neria Surana and her lieutenant, and friend to the Warden Alistair until his death."

Surana of clan Diharen stepped before the stairs of stone in the hall of stone, raised her chin, and began to answer their questions.

* * *

Surana opened her eyes. Cavan was pale in the moonlight, very Fereldan, and the dark spikes of his lashes cast lines of shadows across his cheek. The only time that she had slept beside him in Antiva the air had been scented of green things instead of dogs and his arm had been her pillow. His face was especially guileless in the darkness; she nearly touched it but slipped out of the bed instead, resting her bare feet against the cold floor.

"Ana?"

She shook her head quickly and wrapped her arms around her body. "I can't do this forever. I can't be the King's whore."

The ropes of the bed creaked from sudden movement. "Who has named you my whore?" Cavan demanded, voice sharp.

"Every one of your servants would be calling me this if you were not so careful to leave before morning." Surana turned and gestured at the window. "Careful to make sure that your Elvhen lover does not cost you your shemlen kingdom."

"No," he answered firmly. "No, my proud Surana, 'tis not so. 'Twould be your fate had you a mortal King for a lover, but you do not."

She glanced at him over her shoulder. He was propped up on one arm, the great round muscle of his shoulder made silver and smooth by the moon.

"I will have no other save you," he watched her, his face cast in shadow. "Surely you must have guessed this after so many years. My love for you will not be sacrificed for the sake of Ferelden and Orlais. Ferelden and Orlais are gifts that I will give to you instead."

Surana's stomach tightened. She turned to face him more fully. "I do not understand."

"Do you think, after seeing you and your parents and your brother in my sleep for so long, that I could ever forget the elves?" Cavan leaned toward her. "I will be a better king than Alistair could have been, better than Anora is, better than Calenhad was. The Dales will be returned to your people. The shemlen will respect your people. They will _follow_ you, Ana."

His hand opened toward her and Surana took a step back toward the bed, eyes wide. "Stay with me, my lovely one. The wife of one god freed the Elvhen from slavery; let the wife of another god right the wrongs against them at last."

* * *

_AN: A billion thanks to valiasedai, my beta, who listened patiently to all of my hand-wringing over this difficult chapter! If this reads in English, it's all due to her! And extra thanks to xogs, who prodded me over my nerves and helped me name Surana's clan! Love!_


	16. Chapter 16

Surana was awakened by Cavan's fingers moving lightly down her arm. He kissed her shoulder and she felt a surge behind her. The bedding sank around the empty place where his body had been, the rush of air cold against her skin. Sleep did not come and when the black of night began to fade to morning greys she pushed open the door that joined her room to her father's.

She touched the still-made bed, frowned at the full washbasin, then looked at the door to the hallway. The stone building held masses of shems chattering quickly in Ferelden, and she closed her eyes briefly, thinking of the warm northern Antivan jungles, the scent of prey on her wolf-nose and her power unleashed against the trees.

* * *

She had just finished her eighth braid on an elaborate hairstyle, which would never fit under a helm, when the door burst open.

"My little treasure!" Zevran's shirt was unlaced and hanging loose from his body, his hair all undone and one trouser-leg flopped over his fine leather boots.

"Papà!" She took three quick steps and caught him as he stumbled. Her nose wrinkled. "What have you been drinking?" She toed the door shut and nudged him across the room.

"Well they do call it wine but I do not think the grape has anything to do with it."

Surana started sniffing the air in the manner of one trying to identify a smell while trying to experience said smell as minimally as possible. "And what…?"

"Do you know?" Zevran gave a giddy laugh as he leaned up against the wall. "That I lived for twenty years by a village that didn't even have a brothel? Wait, was it twenty? Thir… how old am I?"

"Wash your face and hands right now." Surana pushed a wet cloth into his fingers.

"However long it was," he said, voice muffled by the cloth. "Horrible little village! Why didn't my Warden and I open a whorehouse instead of running a vineyard? I would've been much better at running a whorehouse after she died." Surana guided him grimly toward the bed and the cloth made a little wet slap on the ground when he dropped it on the way.

"We would have made a lot of money at it too!" he continued after he toppled over on to the bed. "None of this knife-ears business. Now, my Warden, there was a woman who knew what to do with a couple of whores. Sometimes if we had—"

"_Padre. Stop. Talking._ You are ruining my mind forever." Surana tugged at Zevran's boots. He laughed as she jerked his leg.

"You are a lovely little girl, do you know that?" he said into the mattress. "I always wanted your madre to give me a little girl but of course I was delighted with your brother but then the delightful woman gave me the little girl I wanted too."

The second boot thumped to the floor. "Go to sleep now."

"I will stop talking and go to sleep now," Zevran mumbled into the mattress.

* * *

The door banged and Zevran flinched. He sliced his eyes open just enough to identify that it was only Surana and eased them shut again as if the clanging of his lids would make his head hurt worse. It might. In the brief glimpse he took he saw the walls moving.

He felt every single one of his sixty-five years in his body from his heels to his head. Some pinged in his back, some in his shoulders, and several twisted in his belly. "Good afternoon, Papà," said his daughter in her noisy voice, his traitorous daughter who surely knew how the sound of her voice rang in his head like spiked hammers.

"Shhhh," he whispered. "Shhh, it is very important that you don't say anything and come heal your old papà."

"If I healed you then you would go back tonight perhaps, and what if they had poison?" It took Zevran a few moments to piece together the meaning of her words, separate them out from the places each of them struck in his head. The bed felt like it was swaying like the ship.

"I killed two Grand Clerics for you," he murmured, his brows furrowing a little. His baby, withholding her magic. "I had to seduce a priest for the second one, and let me tell you, priests are no good in bed."

She laughed then and he thought perhaps he hated her just a little, hated his own Surana, but then her hands were on either side of his head, pulling the pain away from his body and into her palms and he loved her, loved his little Surana, the most darling daughter any father had.

"Thank you, my treasure." He sat up and rubbed his face, which felt disgustingly sticky for some reason.

"I am glad that you feel better, Papà."

* * *

The sunlight slanting across the room found Zevran and his daughter seated atop his bed. Bread, apples, cheese, and a bottle of 'possibly wine, I don't know' were spread between them. Zevran's chest swelled with pride at the way Surana suspiciously picked through the food, hunting for poison.

"…then he said that he loved me, which was startling enough, but followed this by saying that he wished to marry me." She poured a glass of the wine and held it up to the light before passing it to Zevran. It was murky.

"Marry you?" Zevran frowned. "I cannot fault his excellent taste, but he does realize that he wishes to be a King after Anora dies, yes?"

"He said that it doesn't matter. He compared me to Andraste, Papà." Surana made a pained face; she took a fortifying sip of her drink, coughed, and gagged. "What _is_ this?"

Zevran sniffed the fumes, raised his brow, then took a drink. He coughed delicately. "I believe this is a bastard cousin of whiskey, my treasure. Let me water that down for you a little."

This done, he continued. "Now, Andraste, when I think of her I think of a woman who died in a pillar of fire with a sword through her chest."

"Yes, I know." Surana's shoulders were hunched and her head was bowed. Zevran studied her before throwing back his entire drink and swallowing thickly. It burned its way down to his belly and the fumes filled his nose and mouth.

"I do not need to tell you that I wish that he would leave you alone," he said at last. "This nation-changing business, this was your madre's business, not mine. I would like for you to have a safe and calm life, such as you might have had if you had not been fortunate enough to be born a mage like your brother."

Surana sighed and slid a glance toward him. "I'm still happy to be what I am. Perhaps we should go home then. Shartan is probably wondering about us and I miss my clan."

"Well…." Zevran drew this word out and poured another glass of the terrible Fereldan liquor. "To be honest, I would rather like to stay for a little while longer. Denerim is not so dangerous as Antiva City and I am not truly suited for village life."

Surana's brows lifted. "You didn't like our home?"

The old Crow shook his head quickly. "No, no, it's not like that. It was very nice for when my babies were little, but you know that running the vineyard is not to my taste and you are both grown now. I do not wish to rush back so very quickly."

"We'll stay then." Surana smiled at him at last. "Watch and listen. It will be easier to decide what to do after that, in any case."

* * *

_AN: Many thanks to my beta, valiasedai, and to all of the ladies in the IRC chat for their help with hangover research, particularly sagacious_rage and xogs!_


	17. Chapter 17

_S.A.,_

_Padre has made me throw two letters into the fire so far for being __too revealing,__ so let us hope this one survives. We are staying here for a little while! I would tell you why but I do not wish to have another piece of paper stolen away from me._

_I miss you quite a lot and wish I had your advice for __reasons unnamed.__ I am trying to think of what you would say instead. But I do not mean for you to worry! I have Padre right here and he is an enormous help, yes?_

_I hope that affairs at home are not too much trouble. I hope that someone from my clan has come and you have given them my love. I also hope that it was Rocahre who came as I predicted and that he stayed so that you might teach him more. You are a very good teacher._

_Padre has taken very well to being in Denerim! He is not so cross as he has been! Now he is reading over my shoulder and giving me a look but I will not cross out the words. The city suits him better._

_All of my love and girl-kisses,_

_S.A._

_Addendum: Please send wine back with the messenger because Fereldens do not know how to make drinks worthy of drinking at all. Even the water is very bad. I suspect that they allow their beloved dogs to piss in it to make it "fortifying" or some other horror like this._

* * *

_Greetings from Ferelden!_

_Things are quite exciting here, as you might expect. We have decided to stay a little while longer to enjoy it! I hope everything is as well with you as it is with S. and I!_

_Do not worry about us. We are quite easy to find if you want to look for us. As far as I am concerned, our home now belongs to you entirely, though I am sure that we will be back soon enough! _

_I am very proud of you! I am smiling just now as I think of you. Now off to find another drink to share with S. and laugh at the hideous face she will make._

_All my love,_

_Z._

* * *

"There you are."

Surana dropped the silk onto the merchant's table and peered up at Cavan, his hair almost blue in the bright sun. Three men in shining armor emblazoned with dogs stood around him. "Yes, here I am." She gave a half-smile.

"Where is your father?"

Surana's smile died slowly. "He is looking for rooms for us, I believe. Why?" Her eyes narrowed. "Are you saying that I must not be in the market place alone? I am a hunter of the Diharen clan. They do not put these lines on my face just to be _pretty_, you know."

"And yet they still are," Cavan said, smiling down at her stern face. He switched to Antivan, murdering the liquid words as he always did. "Come, my lovely one. I wish to speak with you alone."

He led her to an alley that stank worse of dogs and waved his guards away. "Why is your father looking for an apartment? Is the Palace too closed-in for your taste? I know I had some trouble with all of the stone myself at first, too."

She smiled at this, and at the Antivan from his lips. She found a place on his side where there was a small gap to his armor and slipped her fingers into it, feeling the warmth of his skin. "He wants to stay longer and felt that we needed a home here."

His smile transformed his face. "This is good news, but will you not stay at the Palace? I am able to keep you better away from the inspection of the Templars there. Over time the entire Chantry will never think to suspect you but my persuasion over the entire city is not to this level yet."

"I will tell Padre this." Surana lifted both of her hands and drew her fingers through his dark hair before coaxing his head down to hers. His guards might be watching but she kissed him, parted his lips and suckled on the tip of his tongue, feeling his great body tremble in response. He broke the kiss and moved his damp lips to her ear, where he whispered her name twice.

He pulled away a little. "Would you go hunting with me?"

"Hunting?"

Cavan grinned. "Yes, hunting, you and I, in the wilds like proper Dalish. I think that we could creep away in a day or two."

Surana smiled at him and touched his beautiful face once more.


	18. Chapter 18

"I still do not like this."

"I know, Padre," Surana sighed, rubbing her forehead. Zevran threw his arm over her shoulders and tightened his hand. "But remember, he has seen me so many times before and it is very plain that he does not wish me to come to harm. I will try to make it quick and I will bring up Shartan's spell."

Zevran made an annoyed sound, but kissed her hair and released her. "You will be fine. Remember everything I've taught you. Keep your heart hard and all will be well. When it is done, tell me, and I will help you get out."

"Thank you, Papà." She dropped her hand and smiled at him.

* * *

Surana's convulsive shiver woke her up and the air that went down her throat was like ice. The wind shook canvas walls. Cavan shifted behind her, drew the furs closer against her with a puff of air that smelled uniquely of Ferelden, then rested his hand between her breasts. Magic warmed his touch, spread heat beneath her skin; she shifted her head against his arm. He kissed her hair.

"When your clan would move to the northern jungles I would grow so uncomfortable," he whispered sleepily. "I had to search longer because you were harder to find there, and the heat is unlike anything we have here."

"I never guessed that you hated it so much."

His hand moved down the curve of her belly and then up again, the edge of his thumb tucked under her breast. "In my memory I now confess a fondness for it. When I feel heat like that now I think about how your skin felt in it. I tasted the scent of those flowers when I tasted you." His hand cradled her breast and trapped her nipple between two strong fingers. "You must remember how you overwhelmed me then."

He lifted his hand and slipped his middle finger into her mouth, warm and pressing on her tongue, as he shifted down to bite her shoulder. She made a small sound around his finger and shifted her hips to rub against him. He breathed her name. She turned her head away from his finger in her mouth.

"Cavan," she gasped. "Touch me, Cavan," and as his hands crept down her body to stroke and bury his fingers within her, she forgot that he was a god, forgot that he was anything but hers.

* * *

Surana returned with the skinned hares, hands dripping from the river, just as Cavan threw an armload of logs into a haphazard pile. The fire that he tossed from his hand was white and when it hit the wood Surana had to close her eyes against the heat that blew past her briefly like a breeze.

"Cavan." Her voice sounded hard and she stopped. He looked up at her from his crouch beside the fire and raised his dark brows. He opened his hand and she gave him the meat.

Surana thought of the guards of the palace, how they had relaxed as her padre spoke with them. She thought of Shartan and the men laughing with him with cheap wine around a bonfire. She even thought dimly of her madre, her matter-of-fact madre who had managed to unite armies by the force of her will. She sighed and crouched beside Cavan.

"How are you so certain that the Chantry does not notice you?" she asked bluntly. "Your magic is very strong."

He finished driving the spit through the meat and smiled at her. "Ah, I have seen these questions on your face." He set it over the fire and sat back, wiping his hands on a cloth. She prodded the roots that he had laid to roast in the coals with a stick.

"My clan," she said. His smile tilted. "The Landsmeet. I felt what you did."

Cavan stretched out on the earth, not far from her, and cushioned his head on his hand. "You are so lovely, Surana." She looked down at him, light flickering across her face, and waited. "Do you remember when I told you my true name?" he said at last. "Urthemiel." She nodded.

His eyes closed. "Sometimes," he murmured, his voice dropped a touch deeper, "when you say my name so sweetly, I wish that Urthemiel fell from your lips and not Cavan."

A drop of blood seeped from the meat and fell into the fire, where it sizzled. "'Tis a horrible place to start, but think of the darkspawn horde and how they followed my whims." He cracked an eye to see the troubled expression on her face. "Every tainted creature is struck by a desire to destroy all that lives, and I was no different. Again I am quite grateful that your mother freed me from the existence that I had been condemned to."

His eyes opened fully to study her face. "The darkspawn were easy to control, leaping to work at my thought, but my ability to be compelling was not a facet of the taint. All of my life that I can remember mortal creatures have yearned to listen to the beauty of my thoughts. Most of my life I have not even been aware of it, but knew that the natural order was one where I spoke and was obeyed."

Surana rocked to her feet and stepped back, her arms around herself. The god sat up again and watched her, his elbow on his knee, and his voice coming calm. "'Twas Morrigan who taught me how to shield certain people from my will when I was a child, after she caught herself serving a supper made entirely of berry jam. "

"You have done this to me," said Surana, but her voice wavered, the lines of her vallaslin bunched as her brows drew together. "Changed my thoughts."

"Never." He slowly rose to his feet. "Think on it for a moment, if you will. You have known me six years now and it took me three long years before I dared kiss you. Had I wished it, I would have allowed you to see my will directly and I would have had you within an hour of meeting you. I've never touched your mind nor that of anyone in your family."

He opened his hand to her; she stepped back. "Please," he said. "I find such a fine beauty in your thoughts and in watching you open to me over time. I," and he hesitated over the words, closing his eyes briefly and swallowing once. He looked on her again. "I do not know what to say. Even if you walk away from me I will still do all that I have said. I desire nothing more than order and beauty for Thedas."

Urthemiel took a step closer, his hand still open to her. "Please, Surana."

She turned her head half away as she looked up at him, still mistrustful, but finally stepped closer. He closed his arms around her with a sigh. Her arms crept about his ribs and she touched her forehead to his collarbone. "You must know that for her love Andraste died a terrible death," she said. "It is an alarming comparison."

He released her to cup her face instead, coax it to tip up toward his as he crouched a little to watch her eyes, quite close. "Then the Maker did not love so well as I do. No one will touch you, my Surana, not even I."

* * *

The coals were burned low and Cavan laid beside Surana with the stars strewn wide above them. "Is there anything I can do to win your trust?"

Surana wove her fingers into the hair above his brow and did not look at him, her eyes reflecting pale lights and dark shadows from the sky. "Break the spell on my brother."

His hand slipped from her cheek to her throat, his thumb and finger spanning the arch of her collarbones. "Your father will try to kill me, I think."

This made her gaze turn to him again, to the god, his face open and anxious. "Yes, I know. Break the spell, do not kill my father or brother, and spare your own life. I ask too much, but you are the only person that I believe could do it."

She pulled on his hair and the stars were blacked out as he kissed her. "It is the only thing that I want that you can give me, Urthemiel," she said as she studied his shadowed face.

"Then I swear that I'll do it." The shadows shifted to reveal the shape of his smile and the warmth of his body mingled with that of the fire when the chill of the night would have come.

* * *

_AN: Thanks again to my beta, Valiasedai! She's the very best ever!_


	19. Chapter 19

The Tower teaches that there are no roads through the Fade, and yet it was a wide path of gold striated with red that Cavan stepped away from when he entered the vineyard. He breathed deep. The air smelled of green growth and the distant sea and of home and he smiled.

He opened the door to the house and eventually found Surana's brother bent over a ledger book, the movements of his body and his cropped blonde hair more familiar to Cavan than his own face. "Shartan."

Shartan glanced up. "Cavan." he smiled. He glanced down again and paused while scratching his pen along the paper. "Surana is back with her clan. Or did you come to visit us? Padre will be pleased." He gave a wicked grin, his eyes still on his work.

Cavan sat in the chair of polished wood that rested beside the desk. "This is a dream, my friend, and I need you to open your eyes and listen to me."

Shartan laughed and blotted the paper. "No, I think not. I just sold twenty bottles to a ship bound for Rivain."

"Do you ever stop to consider that you may be the most powerful mage in Thedas from your long association with me? 'Tis astonishing when one considers how utterly untried you are within the Fade itself. Look at where you are. I have a task that I cannot complete without you."

Shartan's brown eyes widened and Cavan felt a surge of magic from him. The elf stood so quickly that his chair was knocked away, and before it hit the ground the world erupted in flames. Heat blasted all of the hair from Cavan's body in the instant before he surrounded himself with cold air and healing magic.

The flames died away and Shartan of course was gone, for he was the one who fuelled them. Cavan opened his eyes to watch the ledger collapse into ash on the broken desk a moment before the entire vineyard vanished. He looked over the small island of reeds and broken stone once before returning to the blood red path.

* * *

"Mother!" Surana's eyes snapped open at Cavan's voice and he pressed her face to his chest. He threw his blankets up over her head and frowned in the darkness. "Have you no shame?"

"You are always in company during the day and at night you sleep elsewhere," said a woman's voice. "You finally spend one night in your room, and I come to find you with an elf in your bed. Forgive me if I do not wish to spend weeks more hovering about your bedchamber. Let us speak alone. I have news."

Surana scowled and shoved at Cavan's chest. "Turn about and let us clothe ourselves," he answered.

"Is the elf the reason why you have lingered so long in Denerim, I wonder?" Cavan pressed a silent kiss to Surana's hair as his mother spoke. They both rose to dress and Surana studied Morrigan's back as she did so. Morrigan was just slightly hunched with age, the knot of her grey hair streaked through with black from her nape. "I would never imagine you so anxious for that Queen's company."

Surana folded her arms and made no move for the door. Her mouth felt hardened in its frown. "Enough, Morrigan," said Cavan in his mild voice, sitting on the edge of the bed wearing only his trousers. He tossed a single spark from his fingertip to a lamp. "Turn and be polite to Surana Arainai."

The witch turned a flashed a sharp glance at her son before settling her yellow eyes upon Surana. "Surana Arainai, you say?" Morrigan was strikingly lovely in the way that some women gain as they age; Surana found herself wondering if she was also beautiful in her youth. Her mother had never written anything about Morrigan's physical features in her grimoire. "No. Neria Surana bore a son and an older one than this child. I see no trace of the Warden in her face. Speak up, girl, was it she who bore you?"

Surana's lip curled. "Yes, Neria was my mother, shemlen witch."

Morrigan laughed, her voice rich. "Shem, you say, and yet you wake in the bed of my son." She looked back to Cavan, gems at her throat flashing in the lamplight. "Montsimmard and Val Firmin have united to retake Val Foret. You will lose all of your lands if you do not tend to them." She lifted a shoulder. "I care not but thought to bring this news, for your messengers will not arrive for at least another week."

She stepped back to the open window, where clouds cloaked the stars, and nodded at Surana. "No doubt you will not tell me the game that you are playing at with this child even if I asked. It is foolish and reckless, Cavan, and you would do well to remember that you are no longer that which you remember being." She turned her sharp eyes directly to Surana. "Harm my son, and you can be certain that you will pay, as will every person you have ever loved. Farewell, Cavan."

"You—" Surana gasped, but Morrigan was already snapping into another form and her black feathers were soon lost against the shadows of the night sky. "—she.."

Cavan laughed and fell back against the bed, covering his face with his hands. "Well, that went as well as could be expected, wouldn't you say?" He opened his arms to the gaping Surana and smiled. "Come back to bed, my lovely one. I will answer any question that you have and if you intend kill me as Morrigan believes, then I only ask that you make love to me again before you do so."

He caught her hand when she came close enough and tucked a smiling kiss into the palm. The tight muscles of her shoulders eased a little.

* * *

Cavan found Shartan walking between the vines this time, the trees by the river a distant dark line. "Shartan," he said. "Shartan, look at me, my friend."

Shartan turned and his brown eyes flew wide. Destruction exploded from his body but only touched the land, searing the vines to black and lighting the distant trees on fire. "Cavan," he gasped, then coughed when he breathed ashes. He had scars twisting up his left arm now, straining as he bent over.

"Come," said Cavan. "I'm trying to undo the spell that your mother placed on you, and I need your help to do it. Tell me what has happened as we go."

Shartan followed him through fields collapsing into dirt, their boots crunching into dead wood and charred leaves. "The vineyard is burned down. We lost everything," he said, voice stretched thin. "Tell them that I am making for Ayesleigh to find a ship to Denerim. I… they are safe, yes?"

"Yes, I keep them safe." Cavan stopped, his heels upon the road of blood woven with magic, and turned. Shartan's face was still but there was a tightness around his eyes. "I… I am sorry," said Cavan. "I have only been there once, but 'twas also my home in my dreams. I…" his voice firmed. "I can make those responsible pay for what they have done to you."

Shartan closed his eyes, his face briefly collapsing into the tight curl of grief, but he took a deep, strained breath and opened them again. "Let no harm come to Surana and Padre and I will be content." Cavan inclined his head.

Shartan poured his magic into the road under Cavan's instruction, his power flowing from him in bright gold strands. The god tangled his hands in the strands of Neria's blood and wrenched them apart. He fell to his knees, dimly aware of Shartan's scream, his soul briefly shredded in his body. He collapsed on the roadway.

"Ow," said Shartan eventually. Cavan lifted his head. Most of the blood ties had been pulled away from Shartan's side, but it was bound even more tightly toward Cavan. "Let us not do that again." Blood leaked from Shartan's nose to drip on the path. "At least not until I am in a comfortable bed."

"Indeed," sighed Cavan. "I will need to consult with Morrigan."

* * *

_AN: My thanks to sagacious_rage for the beta job, and thank you guys so much for reading! Your reviews inspire me so much!_


	20. Chapter 20

_Greetings from Antiva!_

_I will try to write something that Z. would not wish to throw into the fire. First, Z., my sympathy is to you for being forced to endure a holiday with S. in a country without proper wine. She is likely barely tolerable. It is a joke S. do not pull such a face! And there is my advice. Try to have a little bit of fun and not worry so much! Let Z. do the worrying for you. He is experienced with the sort of place where you are._

_Everything is fine and boring here. I have made a good profit while you have been gone. I would say that I would buy you both presents but because you are on holiday I expect that I am the one who is owed gifts. I will like whatever you get me as long as it is expensive and smells properly of dogs._

_Also S., Rocahre did visit and he stayed with me for a little while. The clan did send their greetings but I had the impression that they do not like it so much that you are gone. I cannot fault them for their good taste, yes?_

_With love from the sensible one,_

_S.A._

* * *

"I do not know." Cavan stripped off his gauntlets and hung them from an armor stand. "He must have sent it before the trouble happened."

Surana scanned the letter again, fingers supporting the red wax at the top. "What happened?" she asked, pleading a little. "Truly, you can tell us nothing more?"

"Shartan is not very skilled at manipulating the Fade." Surana left the letter on a table and moved to help Cavan undo the buckles to his practice armor. He glanced at Zevran when she did that, but the Crow's eyes gave no secrets away. "I do teach him as quickly as I can, but he falls into dreams easily. It is difficult to understand what has happened."

She helped him lift his breastplate away and he hung the battered metal beside the golden armor of King Maric. "When you go to Orlais we will have no more news," Surana said, voice soft.

Cavan's chainmail jingled as he reached out to touch her shoulder. "He will be glad to see you when he comes here. Remember, your brother is quite powerful, much like you."

"Yes," said Zevran, low, from where he prowled the edge of the room. "A very powerful maleficar. Let us hope that there are no templars on that ship."

* * *

"Do you trust him?" Zevran asked when the evening fell.

"I, I don't really know."

"It is stunning to me that he wears the armor of the old Ferelden king. Your Madre and our companions had to cut that armor away from the darkspawn as we killed them. His creatures had cast spells upon the king's corpse and skewered it up to hang in the sky."

"Do you not think it true, then, when he says that he was driven mad by the darkspawn curse?" Surana asked, her brows lifted. "I have never known you to go on about such crimes. You were the Grandmaster."

"I know, Ana, but even I am shocked that one such as he would dare put on the armor of King Cailan and later crawl into the bed of the daughter of Neria Surana. Truly he must be without shame at all. Do not trust him."

* * *

Surana stroked her finger back and forth across Cavan's lip. Black stubble scratched one side of the tip. He smiled, eyes closed against the pillow, and shifted his arm slightly to loop it better around her waist.

"You are a god," she whispered.

"Mmm."

Her next words were even quieter. "Which means that nothing can happen to you in Orlais."

He opened one eye to look up at her. "I am yet in a human body. And, to be honest, I believe that I've made the spell with your brother worse somehow, so that it harms me as well. I hope that his journey is safe indeed and I've no reason to discover if this is so."

Her eyes fell, and her thumbnail scratched over the stubble on his chin. His smile widened. "Why, my beautiful Ana, do you _worry_ for my sake?"

She closed her eyes and laid down to rest her head in the cradle of his shoulder. Her hand curved over the crown of his head. "I do not yet know what to think of you, Cavan, but come back. Come back to me, so that I can still decide."

He caught her chin and lifted it up. She met his mouth and in her kiss there was something soft to match the slow tenderness of his lips.

* * *

_AN: This update is dedicated with love to Xogs the Brave. Thanks to valiasedai for the beta work! Cavan would make no sense without her. And thank you all for your comments and support!_


	21. Chapter 21

Prince Cavan's horse danced in a circle as the people of Denerim cheered, Maric's armor catching any weak finger of light to flash back gold. _Don't watch him go_, whispered Zevran, _people will mark your glance and you will be a target,_ but it was of no use, for it was noted that the blue sash that snapped in the wind from the hilt of Cavan's sword was embroidered in an arched design. Perhaps the Prince was honoring the elvhen goddess Mythal, but the rumor went that he was honoring the Dalish girl, Neria's child, and the marks were made to match the lines on her face.

* * *

"Yes, I did understand that you are still my guest."

Surana looked up and the Queen was standing there, a white shadow at the top of the stairs, her hand against the wall. Her head trembled slightly as it sometimes did. "Yes," answered Zevran's daughter. She hesitated. "My father and I are in gratitude for your hospitality."

"Just as I am grateful for your aid in resolving the succession crisis." Anora lifted her head as Surana climbed nearer. "Though to be honest, I believe that the Landsmeet was on the verge of accepting him."

Surana studied her. Her eyes were a sharp and clear blue, but her hair escaping its confines in wisps like spider's silk and her fingers were white against the wall to stay the trembling. "I did wonder why he needed me," she confessed.

"I wonder why he has kept you here instead of Gwaren," Anora answered in a lower voice, and for a moment the trembling in her body stilled. "But he is powerful and intelligent as much as he is good and kind, and it is the best that I will hope for."

* * *

"I am not giving you a 'look,' my treasure," Zevran said under his breath. Surana followed him, his steps smooth and yet she was nearly running to keep up.

"Yes, yes, you are, that look, the one you give to the nobles and," Surana waved her hands. "People. To the threats. Why are you giving me this look?"

Zevran stopped and set his key into the lock that opened the suite of their rooms. "Is it anything like the look that you give me after I have been about my business? Truly, Surana, I wonder who has raised you, that you think that I should be some pure prince like those that you associate with. You have grown too much like an Antivan woman, I think." There was a snick as the tumblers finally turned and he opened the door. "Or no, it is not the Antivan in you, it is the Dalish. Bless them with whatever gods you like, but my own daughter is a prude, save for her own bed."

"_Padre!"_ hissed Surana, eyes narrowed. "I have no idea what I am doing and must drag you away from some Shemlen whorehouse for help!"

Zevran turned at her, his own eyes narrowed. "Listen to me, little one—"

"Yes, yes, this is rather how I expected things were going, to tell you the truth," said an amused voice in the room, for there was Shartan, sitting in one of the chairs before the hearth, his lips curved in a smile that made a lie of his emotionless eyes. "Should I douse you both in ice? Padre told me to do something like that once as I remember."

The other two stopped. Surana was flustered, her hand on the closed door, but Zevran hesitated only a moment in the argument before striding to the chair. "My son," he said, voice a little rough, as Shartan stood. The men embraced, Zevran's muscles standing out, Shartan's head dropping to his father's shoulder. Surana came to one side and the pins in her hair were tugged free as she pushed herself under their arms.

* * *

Shartan ate his Fereldan stew without comment and Surana reached forward, flicking his hair up to study how his skin melted into scar. "No mana at all then?"

Shartan swallowed and reached back to brush her fingers away from his skin. "Yes, that is the funny thing about Templars. Also, let me tell you, don't try to heal with blood magic. Madre never wrote that down. Very powerful, yes, but no good for healing. Don't try it." He took a breath and pushed away his dish. "What are we arguing about?"

Surana took a seat closer to the fire and both of the men watched her. "Your sister," said Zevran with a smile, his Antivan words half-whispered, "she is thinking maybe she should be a Queen."

"I have said no such thing," she snapped.

"And why should she not be, if she wants to?" Shartan glanced at Zevran, heat in his voice. "These humans, that Chantry, they take our land, they make us run. They made Madre run, they made you a slave boy, they make me run, they make the Dalish run. Let _them_ run, I say. If my sister wants to be their Queen, let her be." Shartan's voice raised and Surana watched his brown eyes narrow, his face turn red. "They took my vineyard and I say that is _enough!"_

The words filled up the room even in the silence that followed and Shartan took a deep breath, his eyes turning to his food again. Zevran laughed. "The words of a dead man, I would say, but look at your old papà, I've forgotten that you are my Warden's children as well. Fine then, change the world if this is what you want."

"I did not say that this is what I want," said Surana again.

"You are safe, Ana." She looked back to Shartan, his merry face made firm. "You know that I would know this better than anyone. He is capable of seeing to it. You are safe to even walk away from him, if you wish it. He values your freedom very much."

She nodded slowly, then smiled. He grinned at her and was briefly like the same brother that she'd always had. "Thank you, Shartan."

"Of course."

* * *

_AN: Thank you, xogs, for the wonderful beta job! And thank you all for making my day by reading my little story!_


	22. Chapter 22

Shartan slipped into Zevran's room and walked to the hearth. His hand slid under the mantle, disappeared into a hollow, then pulled out a purse. Both his father and his sister watched, Surana with her mouth hanging open.

"Too obvious?" she asked, her fingers tracing the spine of the grimoire.

"Only to your brother I am sure. I only need…" Shartan's voice faded as he loosened the drawstrings. "You have nearly as much as you left with still?"

"No, we don't, we have…" Surana's voice trailed off as well when she came to stand beside him, looking down at the coins.

"I took a few jobs," Zevran said into the silence. He picked up Neria's grimoire from the sofa where Surana had abandoned it. "Also I have stopped five attempts to assassinate you, Ana."

"You never said!"

"You have been wary enough. You stopped one attempt yourself by your care with poisons, and nobody tries anything with you anymore. The few who are still interested are after me, not you." He grinned widely. "Also it is a bit flattering that anyone in this world would think that a man of my age could possibly spend so time in a whorehouse."

Surana studied Zevran while Shartan counted out coins and tied up the purse again. "Somebody is after you, papà?"

"Various somebodies have been after me the entire time you've been alive, and now you will worry?" Zevran smoothed his hand across the grimoire before setting it aside. "I am still skilled enough to kill them, my treasure."

"I'm going to the alienage to see where Madre was born," said Shartan as Surana frowned at their father.

"Watch out for pickpockets," she said.

"You should tell the pickpockets to watch out for _me_," Shartan laughed. He flipped a coin in the air and left.

* * *

The man stood there in his filthy splintmail and Shartan thought that he would forever associate the smell of the alieanage with idiot guardsmen, all stale water and unwashed bodies and tiredness. "What have I done to make you demand my weapons?"

"Knife-ears can't carry 'em in the alienage. Now give 'em here." The guard stepped closer to Shartan, reaching for his hilts, and Shartan moved quickly back.

"Oh, this will not be happening, my _ brutto bastardo._ Ignoring how you wish to leave me unarmed in a foreign city, this blade," Shartan pointed to his left shoulder, "was a gift from my mother to my father during the Blight, and the other, I will not tell you where it came from, but it was a gift from my father to me."

"Right then. You can tell it to the captain." The guard's sword scraped against its scabbard as he began to draw his blade.

A voice came quick from the side of the road. "Are you related to Surana Arainai?"

The guard hesitated, his sword half-drawn, and Shartan looked from him to the speaker—an alienage elf, poorly dressed and standing with his head bowed as they often did, as if trying to become invisible while in plain sight.

"Yes," Shartan answered slowly, and the guard took a step back. Shartan lifted his brows. "She is my sister. You know her then, _puzzolente?_" he asked the guard with a smile. "Shall I say hello for you?"

"No, I…" The guard's brows drew together as if he was trying to recall a distant memory. "Obviously I can't take your things if they came from heroes."

"No indeed, my _stupido idiota,_" Shartan said, voice light and friendly. "If an elf is descended from heroes it makes perfect sense that he ought to be allowed the courtesy given to any human, no?"

"Yes." Shartan's fist itched. He could vividly imagine the way the man's nose would break under it. The guard nodded. "Good day to you." and off he went.

Shartan looked back at the elf who had interrupted. He was still there and his head was no longer bowed. He was taller than he had looked, though not as tall as Shartan. "Thank you, my friend."

"No problem. Sometimes they act funny if you bring up your sister's name. Hey, would you like to come back to my house?" He jerked his thumb back up the street. "My aunt met your mother and would be really happy to meet you, too."

Shartan made a quick calculation involving his chances of being robbed blind versus the man's broad shoulders and rather startling blue eyes. He grinned. "I would love to meet her." He offered his hand. "I am Shartan Arainai."

The elf clasped his forearm and gave a smaller smile in return. "Daeron Tabris."

* * *

The house was small but warm just from the number of bodies living in it. Daeron's aunt Shianni, who was really his cousin, was the elder of the alienage. She talked about how his mother had ended a slavery ring, driven the darkspawn out of the alienage when no one else would defend the elves, and had even come to see to the rebuilding; Shartan felt a pang for his secretive madre, dead so long now, and these stories she would never tell herself.

Daeron's mother lived there, and his brother with his two children. He had a sister, Milora, who had gone to Highever alienage, and his father was dead. The food was of terrible quality, but Shartan had eaten worse things after the attack on the vineyard, and the company was wonderful, even if you didn't consider the way that Daeron's fingers glanced across Shartan's when passing a cup or a dish.

Shartan did consider this. He convinced the man to walk with him and the words flowed between them as easy as the tides. Daeron worked at the stables in a manor and showed his calluses; Shartan tried not to let his fingers linger across the other man's palm. Daeron had lived through riots and his father once had been imprisoned just as one started. They didn't notice the growing shadows of evening until the first robber's knife flashed.

There were five of them and they didn't appear to be prepared for Shartan's daggers. He turned after the third one to find Daeron slitting the last one's throat.

"I… I'm sorry," he said as he let the body drop. "Shianni made me learn and—"

Shartan left his father's blade in a body as he stepped over another one to get to Daeron. He caught the back of the man's neck in his hand and lowered his head. Their lips touched, brushing only briefly before the kiss deepened. Daeron made fists against Shartan's short hair and slid his tongue along the inside of Shartan's lip, white breath visible around their faces in the cold air.

* * *

They managed to get into Shartan's room at the palace without upsetting too many people and washed away the worst of the blood. He built up the fire and, on an impulse, opened the only bottle of wine that remained from his family's home. He told Daeron about how much he had loved the people of the village and how much he had loved taking over the business after his mother had left, how it had helped him through his grief. He told him, he… he laughed and stopped talking and kissed him, kissed him again, helped him with the ties on his shirt and knew no shame when Daeron's fingers ran over his scars. By the time the fire had burned down to coals, Daeron was arched off of the bed into Shartan's mouth, moaning out sounds that didn't quite form into words, reaching for Shartan's trousers where they hung loose and low around his hips.

* * *

The winter morning turned the edges of Shartan's window pale grey and sleep had not yet claimed him. Daeron's breath was slow and even across Shartan's chest, his hand curled over Shartan's hair. Shartan tipped his head to kiss Daeron's shoulder and when he shut his eyes the dreams of his home in flames did not come.

* * *

_AN: Thank you to valiasedai and xogs for the fabulous beta work, and to Kismet76 for the Antivan/Italian! If you haven't read Kismet's stuff, check her out. She's and excellent writer and we collaborated once. And thank all of you for your support! You're wonderful!_


	23. Chapter 23

She flew over the softening land, padded through muddy snow on wolf's paws, slept in it when she borrowed the shape of a bear. She landed on human feet in a city that spoke a language she didn't understand. When she found Fereldan soldiers, she applied her own name to them like the tip of a knife. They yielded under its pressure.

She found him in a valley of dripping fir trees, his tent high and gold and easy to slip into. There was no joy more pure than that on the god's face when he found her there, and she buried her face into his black hair. He smelled of sour sweat and tiredness over his fade-tainted lyrium and she loved him, she loved him so much, his hopes and his power and his great shem body.

Much later she was straddling him, her hips aching for how wide he thrust them, and it was then that she told him of the Queen's death. He trailed heat from his hand up her belly, up between her breasts, drawing a shiver out from her in the cold air. "Marry me, Ana," he said. "Please, please marry me."

She touched his face, his smooth brow and the short black stubble of his beard. "I will."

* * *

They stepped out of the tent, a wing of his fur-lined cloak over her shoulders, and the curious eyes of his soldiers watched them. "Do you know where we are?"

She looked down into the valley, wide and empty. "Yes. We are in Orlais to the south of Lydee."

His smile flashed white and he leaned down to see her face better. "We are in the Dales, my lovely one. I am giving them to you."

* * *

She finds good Orlesian wine and carries it back to Denerim. She shares it with her family, circling around her on couches and chairs while she crouches on the floor, feeling unnatural in the palace again after weeks of pine-scented snow melting into her fur. They number four now; Surana can't bring herself to be bitter at how easily Daeron slips among them, even though Cavan has not managed to do this after seven years.

"Queen Surana." Zevran lifts his cup to the light and looks at the color of the wine.

"Queen Surana Arainai," she corrects, and this makes him give a quick and feral grin.

"Yes, this is all very nice, but he could turn from you eventually, and then what?"

Surana and Shartan both laugh. "Yes, I suppose this is possible," says Surana, amused, at the same time that her brother says, "He won't."

"It is too much change at once!" Zevran drains his cup and looks down at his daughter, the loose skin around his eyes making him appear more sad than he perhaps is. "_Tesoro mio,_ you could be killed."

"Yes, yes, I am not stupid." Surana spreads her hands. "But when has an elf ever come this close to making things right again? I am gambling my life for this and it is a small thing to keep all of us from living in fear, yes? And truly I like him." She looks from her father to Shartan. "I do. He is a good man, I think."

"He is." Shartan smiles, but his lover frowns.

"I'm with your father," Daeron coughs after a long drink of his wine. "I don't like being that close to people in power. They hold the handle of the axe, if you think of it that way."

They fall silent after this, but after a moment Surana begins to smile at the fire.

"I am proud of you, little Ana," says Zevran, and she looks up at him, startled. "Your mother would have been proud of you, too, you should know this. Why should I be surprised that my Warden's daughter would grow up to be a queen? I should be surprised instead that she wasn't made a queen herself first." His smile creases the wrinkles on his face until his tattoos are crooked lines.

* * *

The Landsmeet was twice the size of the last, the stone hall full of people with odd titles like the Arl of Montsimmard and the Bann of Jader. The Divine herself came from Val Royeaux to stand in Denerim's palace, and as the god Urthemiel knelt before her, his yellow eyes sliced to the side where they meet Surana's. She stood between her father and brother, the only three elves in the room. She knew his thoughts, knew how he humors the Chantry, knew that this would not last for long.

"My Lords and Ladies of the Landsmeet." Surana closed her eyes briefly as he spoke, feeling the great power of his fair voice rush over her. When she opened her eyes again the humans are watching him, rapt and silent. Shartan leaned against the wall with a faint and bemused smile, while Zevran's sharp gaze flicked over the crowd, hunting for crossbows or bards, no doubt.

"Our nation still mourns the passing of the wise Queen Anora mac Tir, under whom Ferelden prospered as she held the throne in trust for the Calenhad kings for over four decades. We will continue to prosper. We have finally found peace with our Orlesian brothers, and so we will find peace with others. It is in this spirit that I give to you the woman who will be my queen."

He opened his gauntleted hand toward Surana and flashed to her his beautiful smile, his eyes shining. She moved to climb the dias, hearing her father's sigh as she left his side, and reached for Cavan's hand.

"Sire," said a voice with a thick Orlesian accent. "It does not escape our notice that she is an elf." Surana's breath caught; she searched the crowd for the speaker as she climbed the last step but did not find him.

"Our lands have suffered from our relationship with the elves and this must end," Cavan answered firmly, more force set behind his voice. Surana watched heads nod thoughtfully. "We must move forward and heal these wounds that have been made. There is no elf better suited to be your queen; she is the daughter of an Arlessa, the Hero of Ferelden, and through her the ancient lines of Arlathan's nobility will be united with Calenhad's blood. "

His smile returned. "I have loved her for many years and it is with surpassing joy that she is finally betrothed to me, this noblest of elves, Surana Arainai of clan Diharen."

The cheers finally came as he lifted her hand to kiss her knuckles and Surana saw the indulgent smiles on the faces of the nobility. "Look at them," he murmured against her hand, mischief in his eyes. "'Tis you that they follow now, much as they follow me."

* * *

_AN: Dear xogs and valiasedai, thank you so much for making this chapter work, because it was an awful mess when I sent it over. Grammar, what is it?_


	24. Chapter 24

The statue had a smooth face and hair too long and a shield of the wrong shape. "See?" said Surana as she pulled moss from the foot of it. "It reads, 'Neria Surana, Hero of Ferelden.'"

"That was not her name." Zevran's voice was cold and hard and his children both glanced at him with raised brows. "The Wardens, they leave their past behind them, or some such thing. She was the Warden Neria, and then she was Neria Arainai." He was staring at the stone curve of the statue's jaw, and he was almost certain that this was the wrong shape as well, but he… flashes of memories went past, his wife's skin, her mouth, and they were covered in dust, like something he had once dreamed and long forgotten.

* * *

A Warden invited them in and Zevran trailed after his children through the compound. He said nothing as the past climbed through him. Here was where she had ordered Alistair to scrub battle stains from the wall, this was the room that they used to store armor and archdemon blood, and behind that closed door might still be the bed where he had slept with her, where the Crows had attacked them.

"…I escorted her to Orzammar," the Warden was saying, and Zevran's eyes snapped back to him.

"Was she afraid?" asked Shartan, making Zevran snort. The Warden smiled at him.

"She bore her pain well," he answered, smile fading. The desk in the room was one that Neria had used. "She was brave. She was grieving, I think, but a hero to the end."

Zevran looked at the man for a while. Adin, he said his name was, a new recruit when Neria had gone. "Warden Alistair spoke of her love for her husband."

The old Crow smiled a little. "But she did not speak of it herself."

"No," answered Adin, and after a moment added, "but don't be bothered by that. I heard her cry for you once."

* * *

Zevran sat on the pew with his elbows on his knees, his head bent. He had learned decades ago, before he had tried to kill the Wardens, that Fereldan priests were not so forgiving with certain confessions, so he said some of them in his mind, hoping that the Maker would still listen. _The kill was clean and kind. Forgive me for the death._ As he always did, he added, _Forgive Neria for blood magic. She used it against the darkspawn. Please, let her rest at your side._

Through the curtain of his white hair he watched the woman who was dressed like a priest swirl the cup of wine in an alcove. He chased shadows in his mind. Neria's voice was nearly lost to him, existing now in faint snippets of laughter. He found that it was touch that he remembered best, the way that her hips swelled beneath his hands, her thighs solid and slim. He had a sudden memory of the way her shoulder felt in his mouth and his throat went hollow.

"Maker bless you, my son." Zevran looked up. The priest who was not a priest held the cup out to him, her hand shaking only a little. He smiled.

"By your hand, so He does." He took the wine and swallowed it down.

* * *

Zevran opened his eyes and found himself looking through tree leaves to the sky. He slowly stood, crushing weeds beneath his hands. He was on a bluff overlooking a calm sea… no, he was on the bluff near their home, and the beach below was the one where he had taught his family to swim.

"Zev." He turned in time to catch her as she flung herself at him and he fell to the ground, his old bones jarring in the impact, and it was _her_, her honey and cream skin, her smooth face framed by his spotted, thick-knuckled hands. She looked wild and desperate and her eyes were a deeper brown than he remembered and she was kissing him, she was scrambling with his clothes, and she was naked and whimpering his name into his mouth. She took him into her body and used heat to burn away the remaining threads of his clothes; he rolled them over and drove into her, pounded into the body of _his wife, _his, _his Warden, his love, _and as he moved against her squirming form the years fell away from him.

They didn't speak, not properly, not until after the third time they had made love, and if he had known that he could make love to her after he had died he would have poisoned himself years ago. "Was it hard to wait?" he asked.

"Yes," she said, and some sort of pain twisted her face. He kissed her, kissed her eyes and drew his hands up into her hair, her bright red hair that he should never have forgotten. "There are no roads through the Fade."

"I love you." He lifted his head to look into her brown eyes, his blonde hair falling around them.

"I always loved you and didn't tell you." She pulled him down and set her mouth against his again, both of them shaking a little as they kissed. Her eyes closed and he rested his forehead against hers, watching her face, as familiar to him again as his own skin. "Spirits will come for you, _amora_," she said.

His hands drew over her hips and locked her thighs tighter around his waist. "They will not take me without you. We are done with being apart."

"I know." She tugged his hair a little and the feel of it shot down his spine. He would only need to tip his hips a little to enter her again, but he didn't, burying his smile in her shoulder, savoring the want, the feel of her hand on the back of his neck.

* * *

_AN: Thanks to sagacious_rage for being my beta while valiasedai is busy being an important scholar! And thank you for reading!_


	25. Chapter 25

Surana slid her fingers over her father's cold eyes to close them, then dipped the cloth in water. The perfume she had sprinkled in wafted up to sting her nose when she wiped the dried foam away from her father's mouth.

She didn't cry until Daeron found her, but at the touch of his hand on her shoulder she sobbed.

* * *

"Do you ever think for a moment and say to yourself, look there, it is an elf marrying the King of Ferelden?" Shartan murmured.

Daeron looked away from the dais, where Surana was stiff-backed and glaring at the Grand Cleric. "It only works because it's her. Everyone's happy with this."

"Because Cavan is, of course." Shartan kept his eyes on his sister. The Grand Cleric had given in and was now saying the prayer over the still-standing Surana, who would not bow to be made Queen. "Padre would have hated to see this day."

Daeron took his lover's hand and Shartan leaned against him. Cavan held Surana's hand aloft; the Landsmeet cheered for their new queen and under this, Daeron heard Shartan sigh, "But dear Padre never knew him. Cavan is a good man at heart. Madre would have been proud of Ana."


	26. Chapter 26

It was the jerking motion of the two bodies that drew Surana's eye, the way that the man in worn velvet shoved the elf into the hall. The King gave his judgment on each case and Surana watched the pair in the back as the crowd thinned. The human met her eye once; his shoulders sagged. The elf glanced her way as well. His head ducked, but she could see his slight smile. The way his back bowed despite his confidence reminded her of how her father once moved through Antiva City.

"Speak," the seneschal urged once the two came to the fore. The human glanced at her again. "You have come to speak to the King. So speak."

Surana looked up at Urthemiel. His face was blank except for a faint smile. His forearm was warm and solid beneath her hand. Her gaze returned to the elf; he bowed his head to her, eyes bright.

"This elf," started the human with a glance flinched toward Surana, "Farrel, he is. He owns land near mine to the north of Gwaren. My flock went missing and he took them. The seneschal wouldn't pass judgment and it was a mighty struggle to get Farrel all this way."

"Indeed? And what say you, Farrel?"

Farrel's eyes were a pale green and he looked only at Surana, bowing again. His smile was wide. "My family was starving. What was I supposed to do? Wallace is a rich man and it didn't hurt him."

Surana tightened her hand on Cavan's arm and he held to his silence. "You admit to your crime then, da'len." The people lingering in the hall fell silent as she spoke and Farrel's smile faded. "Do you think that you can steal his sheep because I am your queen? I have done so much to see that the Elvhen can own land in Ferelden such as you do and for this you shame me. Cavan, what is the punishment to a theft such as this?"

The King laid his hand over the Queen's. "Thirty lashes."

"Give to him thirty lashings and see that he returns the sheep to Wallace." She frowned down at the seneschal. "And say to our man in Gwaren that he is to not hesitate to give justice to our people in our Teyrnir. Elf and human the same sort of justice. We will visit to see that this is done. Give him this message."

"Of course, my lady."

* * *

_AN: My thanks, as always, to my wonderful beta, valiasedai! And school seems to be easing up so I should be back now! Thanks for your patience!_


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